Camping and woodcraft - Scoutmastercg.com

i8CAMPING AND WOODCRAFTThis instinct for a free life In the open is asnatural and wholesome as the gratification of hungerand thirst and love, it is Nature's recall to thesimple mode of existence that she Intended us for*Our modern life in cities is an abrupt and violentchange from what the race has been bred to thesemany thousands of years. We come from a lineof forebears who, back to a far-distant past, werehunters in the forest, herdsmen on the plains, shepherdsIn the hills, tillers of the soil, or fishermen orsailors at sea; and however adaptive the humanmind may be, these human bodies of ours still stubbornlyinsist on obeying the same laws that FatherAdam's did.There are soothsayers who forecast that, in thecourse of evolution, we shall conform to what arenow abnormal and mischievous conditions ; that manis the most adaptive of all creatures, accommodatinghimself to greater extremes of temperature and soforth than any other of the higher animals; thatmoreover he is constantly inventing machines andprocesses to better his condition, so that we mayreasonably expect him to make even the crowded citya wholesome place of residence, though people dwelltier above tier, and our old-fashioned domestic lifebe quite out of the question.It may be so. We can fix no bounds to Nature'sconforming power. She has produced certain vertebrates,such as the mud-turtle and the hellbender,so eminently adaptive to circumstances that they areequally at hr^me whether immersed in air, water, ormud. Ana there is the Chinaman, who, being of abreed that has been crowded and coerced for thousandsof years, seems to have done away with nerves." He will stand all day in one position without seemingIn the least distressed ; he thrives amidst the mostunsanitary surroundings; overcrowding and bad airare nothing to him ; he does not demand quiet whenhe would sleep, nor even when he Is sick ; he canstarve to death with supreme complacency." A