Camping and woodcraft - Scoutmastercg.com

158 CAMPING AND WOODCRAFTless exertion, than in any kind of boots or shoes.This, too, in rough country. I have often gonetenderfooted from a year's office work and havetraveled in moccasins for w^eeks, over flinty Ozarkhills, through canebrakes, through cypress swampswhere the sharp little immature " knees " are hiddenunder the needles, over unballasted railroad tracks atnight, and in other rough places, and enjoyed nothingmore than the lightness and ease of my footv/ear.After one's feet have become accustomed to thismost rational of all covering they become almost likehands, feeling their way, and avoiding obstacles asthough gifted with a special sense. They can bendfreely. One can climb in moccasins as in nothingelse. So long as they are dry, he can cross narrowlogs like a cat, and pass in safety along treacherousslopes where thick-soled shoes might bring himswiftly to grief. Moccasined feet feel the dry sticksunderneath, and glide softly over the telltales withoutcracking them. They do not stick fast in \nud.One can swim with them as if he were barefoot. Itis rarely indeed that one hears of a man spraining;his ankle when wearing the Indian footgear.Moccasins should be of moose-hide, or, betterstill, of caribou. Elk-hide is the next choice. Deerskinis too thin, hard on the feet for that reason, andsoon wears out. The hide should be Indian-tanned,and ' honest Injun '* at that — that is to say, nottanned with bark or chemicals, in which case (unlessof caribou-hide) they would shrink and dry hardafter a wetting, but made of the raw hide, its fibersthoroughly broken up by a plentiful expenditure ofelbow-grease, the skin softened by rubbing into itthebrains of the animal, and then smoked, so that itwill dry without shrinking and can be made aspliable as before by a little rubbing in the hands.Moccasins to be used in a prickly-pear or cactiAcountry must be soled with rawhide.Ordinary moccasins, tanned by the above process(which properly is not tanning at all), are oniv