The
Latter Is Not For Aesthetic Effect, But To Intercept Actinic
Rays.
It is eight or ten inches wide, is shaped to button close
up under your collar, and extends halfway down your back.
In
addition it is well to wear a silk handkerchief around the neck;
as the spine and back of the head seem to be the most vulnerable
to the sun.
For breeches, suit yourself as to material. It will have to be
very tough, and of fast colour. The best cut is the
"semi-riding," loose at the knees, which should be well faced
with soft leather, both for crawling, and to save the cloth in
grass and low brush. One pair ought to last four months, roughly
speaking. You will find a thin pair of ordinary khaki trousers
very comfortable as a change for wear about camp. In passing I
would call your attention to "shorts." Shorts are loose, bobbed
off khaki breeches, like knee drawers. With them are worn puttees
or leather leggings, and low boots. The knees are bare. They are
much affected by young Englishmen. I observed them carefully at
every opportunity, and my private opinion is that man has rarely
managed to invent as idiotically unfitted a contraption for the
purpose in hand. In a country teeming with poisonous insects,
ticks, fever-bearing mosquitoes; in a country where vegetation is
unusually well armed with thorns, spines and hooks, mostly
poisonous; in a country where, oftener than in any other a man is
called upon to get down on his hands and knees and crawl a few
assorted abrading miles, it would seem an obvious necessity to
protect one's bare skin as much as possible. The only reason
given for these astonishing garments is that they are cooler and
freer to walk in. That I can believe. But they allow ticks and
other insects to crawl up, mosquitoes to bite, thorns to tear,
and assorted troubles to enter. And I can vouch by experience
that ordinary breeches are not uncomfortably hot or tight.
Indeed, one does not get especially hot in the legs anyway. I
noticed that none of the old-time hunters like Cuninghame or Judd
wore shorts. The real reason is not that they are cool, but that
they are picturesque. Common belief to the contrary, your average
practical, matter-of-fact Englishman loves to dress up. I knew
one engaged in farming-picturesque farming-in our own West, who
used to appear at afternoon tea in a clean suit of blue overalls!
It is a harmless amusement. Our own youths do it, also,
substituting chaps for shorts, perhaps. I am not criticising the
spirit in them; but merely trying to keep mistaken shorts off
you.
For leg gear I found that nothing could beat our American
combination of high-laced boots and heavy knit socks. Leather
leggings are noisy, and the rolled puttees hot and binding. Have
your boots ten or twelve inches high, with a flap to buckle over
the tie of the laces, with soles of the mercury-impregnated
leather called "elk hide," and with small Hungarian hobs.
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