Part 26 (1/2)
Marks on Trees--Cutting Marks.--A very excellent ”tree-line” is made by cutting deep notches in a line of trees, starting from some conspicuous object, so that the notches will face the men that are to be guided by it: the trees must be so selected that three, or at least two of them, are in sight at once. The notch or sliced bark of a tree is called a ”blaze” in bush language. These blazed trees are of much use as finger-posts on a dark night. They are best made by two persons; one chipping the trees on his right, and the other those on his left. If the axes are quite sharp, they only need to be dropped against the tree in order to make the chip. Doing so, hardly r.e.t.a.r.ds a person in his walking.
Another way more suitable to some kinds of forests, is to strike the knife into the left side of the tree, to tear down a foot of bark, and to leave the bark hanging, for a double extent of white surface is shown in this way. Also, to break down tops of saplings and leave them hanging: the undersides of the leaves being paler than the upper, and the different lines of the reversed foliage make a broken bush to look unnatural among health trees, and it quickly arrests the attention. If you want a tree to be well-scored or slashed, so as to draw attention to it without fail, fire bullets into it, as into a mark, and let the natives cut them out in their own way, for the sake of the lead. They will effect your purpose admirably, without suspecting it.
Stamping Marks on Trees.--The keepers of some of the communal forests in Switzerland are provided with small axes, having the back of the axe-head worked into a large and sharp die, the impression of the die being some letter or cipher indicating the commune. When these foresters wish to mark a tree, they give it first a slice with the edge of the axe, and then (turning the axe) they deal it a heavy blow with the back of the axe-head. By the first operation they prepare a clean surface for their mark; and, by the second, they stamp their cipher deeply into the wood.
Branding Trees.--Some explorers take branding irons, and use them to mark each of their camping-places with its number. This is especially useful in Australian travel, where the country is monotonous, and there are few natives to tell the names of places.
f.a.ggot hung to a Tree.--A bundle of gra.s.s or twigs about 2 feet long, slung by its middle athwart a small tree, at the level of the eye, by the side of a path, is well calculated to catch the attention. Its lines are so different to those seen elsewhere in the forest, that it would be scarcely possible to overlook it.
Boat or Canoe Routes through lakes well studded with islands, can be well marked by tr.i.m.m.i.n.g conspicuous trees until only a tuft of branches is left at the top. This is called, in the parlance of the ”Far West,” a ”lopstick.”
Wooden Crosses.--A simple structure like fig. 1 is put together with a single nail or any kind of las.h.i.+ng. It catches the attention immediately.
[Fig. 1. Sketch of cross as described].
Marks with Stones.--Marks cut on Stone.--I have observed a very simple and conspicuous permanent mark used in forest-roads, as represented in fig. 2. The stone is 8 inches above ground, 3 1/2 wide, 8 inches long: the mark is black and deeply cut. An arrow-head may be chiselled in the face of a rock and filled with melted lead. With a small ”cold” chisel, 3 inches long and 1/4 inch wide, a great deal of stone carving may be readily effected.
[Sketch of stone with incised cross].
Piles of Stones.--Piles of stones are used by the Arabs in their deserts, and in most mountain-tracts. ”An immense length of the road, both in the government of the Don Cossacks and in that of Tambov, is marked out on a gigantic scale by heaps of stones, varying from 4 to 6 feet high. These are visible from a great distance; and it is very striking to see the double row of them indicating the line of route over the Great Steppe - undulations which often present no other trace of the hand of man.”
(Spottiswoode.)
[Sketch of piled stones].
Gipsy Marks.--When gipsies travel, the party that goes in advance leaves marks at cross-roads, in order to guide those who follow. These marks are called ”patterans;” there are three patterans in common use. One is to pluck three large handfuls of gra.s.s and to throw them on the ground, at a short distance from one another, in the direction taken; another is, to draw a cross on the ground, with one arm much longer than the rest, as a pointer--a cross is better than any other simple mark, for it catches many different lights. (In marking a road, do not be content with marking the dust--an hour's breeze or a shower will efface it; but take a tent-peg, or sharpened stick, and fairly break into the surface, and your mark will be surprisingly durable.) The third of the gipsy patterans is of especial use in the dark: a cleft stick is planted by the road-side, close to the hedge, and in the cleft, is an arm like a signpost. The gipsies feel for this at cross-roads, searching for it on the left-hand side. (Borrow's 'Zincali.') A twig, stripped bare, with the exception of two or three leaves at its end, is sometimes laid on the road, with its bared end pointing forwards.
Other similar marks of direction and locality, in use in various parts of the world are as follows:--Knotting twigs; breaking boughs, and letting them dangle down; a bit of white paper in a cleft stick; spilling water, or liquid of any kind, on the pathway; a litter made of paper torn into small shreds, or of a stick cut into chips, or of feathers of a bird; a string, with papers knotted to it, like the tail of a boy's kite--tie a stone to the end of it, and throw it high among the branches of a tree.
Paint.--Whitewash (which see), when mixed with salt, or grease, or glue size, will stand the weather for a year or more. It can be painted on a tree or rock: the rougher the surface on which it is painted, the longer will some sign of it remain.
Black for Inscriptions is made by mixing lamp-black (which see) with some kind of size, grease, wax, or tar. Dr. Kane, having no other material at hand, once burnt a large K with gunpowder on the side of a rock. It proved to be a durable and efficient mark. When letters are chiselled in a rock, they should be filled with black to make them more conspicuous.
Blood leaves a mark of a dingy hue, that remains long upon a light-coloured, absorbent surface, as upon the face of sandy rocks.
ON FINDING THE WAY.
Recollection of a Path.--It is difficult to estimate, by recollection only, the true distances between different points in a road that has been once travelled over. There are many circ.u.mstances which may mislead, such as the accidental tedium of one part, or the pleasure of another; but besides these, there is always the fact, that, in a long day's journey, a man's faculties of observation are more fresh and active on starting than later in the day, when from the effect of weariness, even peculiar objects will fail to arrest his attention. Now, as a man's recollection of an interval of time is, as we all know, mainly derived from the number of impressions that his memory has received while it was pa.s.sing, it follows that, so far as this cause alone is concerned, the earlier part of his day's journey will always seem to have been disproportionately long compared to the latter. It is remarkable, on taking a long half-day's walk, and subsequently returning, after resting some hours, how long a time the earlier part of the return journey seems to occupy, and how rapidly different well-remembered points seem to succeed each other, as the traveller draws homewards. In this case, the same cause acts in opposite directions in the two journeys.
To Walk in a Straight Line through Forests.--Every man who has had frequent occasion to find his way from one place to another in a forest, can do so without straining his attention. Thus, in the account of Lord Milton's travels, we read of some North American Indians who were incapable of understanding the white man's difficulty in keeping a straight line; but no man who has not had practice can walk through trees in a straight line, even with the utmost circ.u.mspection.
After making several experiments, I think the explanation of the difficulty and the way of overcoming it are as follows:--If a man walks on a level surface, guided by a single conspicuous mark, he is almost sure not to travel towards it in a straight line; his muscular sense is not delicate enough to guard him from making small deviations. If, therefore, after walking some hundred yards towards a single mark, on ground that preserves his track, the traveller should turn round, he will probably be astonished to see how sinuous his course has been. However, if he take note of a second mark and endeavour to keep it strictly in a line with the first, he will easily keep a perfectly straight course. But if he cannot find a second mark, it will not be difficult for him to use the tufts of gra.s.s, the stones, or the other accidents of the soil, in its place; they need not be precisely in the same line with the mark, but some may be on the right and some on the left of it, in which case, as he walks on the perspective of their change of position will be symmetrical.
Lastly, if he has not even one definite mark, but is walking among a throng of forest trees, he may learn to depend wholly on the symmetry of the changes of perspective of the trees as a guide to his path. He will keep his point of sight unchanged and will walk in its direction, and if he deviates from that direction, the want of symmetry in the change of perspective on either side of the point on which he wishes to walk, will warn him of his error. The appreciation of this optical effect grows easily into a habit. When the more distant view happens to be shut out, the traveller must regain his line under guidance similar to that by which a sailor steers who only looks at his compa.s.s at intervals--I mean by the aspect of the sky, the direction of the wind, and the appearance of the forest, when it has any peculiarity of growth dependent on direction. The chance of his judgment being erroneous to a small extent is the same on the right hand as on the left, consequently his errors tend to compensate each other. I wish some scientific traveller would rigidly test the powers of good bushmen and find their ”probable” angular deviation from the true course under different circ.u.mstances. Their line should be given to them, and they should be told to make smokes at intervals. The position of these smokes could be easily mapped out by the traveller.
The art of walking in a straight line is possessed in an eminent degree by good ploughmen. They always look ahead, and let the plough take care of itself.
To find the way down a Hill-side.--If on arriving at the steep edge of a ridge, you have to take the caravan down into the plain, and it appears that a difficulty may arise in finding a good way for it; descend first yourself, as well as you can, and seek for a road as you climb back again. It is far more easy to succeed in doing this as you ascend, than as you descend: because when at the bottom of a hill, its bold bluffs and precipices face you, and you can at once see and avoid them: whereas at the top, these are precisely the parts that you overlook and cannot see.
Blind Paths.--Faintly-marked paths over gra.s.s (blind paths) are best seen from a distance.