For Travelling
In Upper India This Arrangement Is Used Almost Universally.
Mr.
Knight obtained his during the Chitral campaign, and since then has
used it in every war.
He had it with Kuroki's army during this last
campaign in Manchuria. {6}
A more compact form of valise and bed combined is the "carry-all," or
any of the many makes of sleeping-bags, which during the day carry
the kit and at night when spread upon the ground serve for a bed.
The one once most used by Englishmen was Lord Wolseley's "valise and
sleeping-bag." It was complicated by a number of strings, and
required as much lacing as a dozen pairs of boots. It has been
greatly improved by a new sleeping-bag with straps, and flaps that
tuck in at the ends. But the obvious disadvantage of all sleeping-
bags is that in rain and mud you are virtually lying on the hard
ground, at the mercy of tarantula and fever.
The carry-all is, nevertheless, to my mind, the most nearly perfect
way in which to pack a kit. I have tried the trunk, valise, and
sleeping-bag, and vastly prefer it to them all. My carry-all differs
only from the sleeping-bag in that, instead of lining it so that it
may be used as a bed, I carry in its pocket a folding cot. By
omitting the extra lining for the bed, I save almost the weight of
the cot. The folding cot I pack is the Gold Medal Bed, made in this
country, but which you can purchase almost anywhere. I once carried
one from Chicago to Cape Town to find on arriving I could buy the bed
there at exactly the same price I had paid for it in America. I also
found them in Tokio, where imitations of them were being made by the
ingenious and disingenuous Japanese. They are light in weight,
strong, and comfortable, and are undoubtedly the best camp-bed made.
When at your elevation of six inches above the ground you look down
from one of them upon a comrade in a sleeping-bag with rivulets of
rain and a tide of muddy water rising above him, your satisfaction,
as you fall asleep, is worth the weight of the bed in gold.
My carry-all is of canvas with a back of waterproof. It is made up
of three strips six and a half feet long. The two outer strips are
each two feet three inches wide, the middle strip four feet. At one
end of the middle strip is a deep pocket of heavy canvas with a flap
that can be fastened by two straps. When the kit has been packed in
this pocket, the two side strips are folded over it and the middle
strip and the whole is rolled up and buckled by two heavy straps on
the waterproof side. It is impossible for any article to fall out or
for the rain to soak in.
Enter page number
PreviousNext
Page 99 of 106
Words from 51332 to 51834
of 55169
