The daily journal. (Salem, Or.) 1899-1903, 1902-07-19
POINTS
ABOUT
CAMPING
Suggestions as to Enjoyment
of Bacon
COmmuning Face TO Face With
Old Dame Nature
(Tacoma Ledger)

p
son everybody plans a camping trip
and few really get started But
whether one goes or stays the ulti
mate results in human happiness are
about the same. Our business is
among the complexities and conven.
tionalities of life, and camping OUT
Is concession to our primal natures.
Frequently we are made to realize
that we or at least our friends.
should have not made the concession.
Camping gives us an opportunity TO
cultivate the gentle savage that is in
us, and the acquaintanccship often
furnishes valuable, though unpleasant.
footnotes to character. The universal
desire for camping shows that we are
all about the same distance removed
from our aboriginal ancestors, and the
experience itself usually proves that
the conventional standards of society
are but straw Notifications for the
weak. Camping is democratic in
! stitution which puts everybody on the
same basis. It brings a man down
next to the soil, and makes him en-.
dure hardships and perform things
for himself that he has been used to
having done for him by others. The
experience is as good as courtship
or a business failure to test the met
tie of a man. Sometimes he shows
up we'll and sometimes he fails woe
fully. II depends on the man. As a |
rule the camp fire exposes a number
OF pitiful skeletons in any party that
has the courage to get out of sight of
the town
II one enjoys n good, respectable !
town friendship II is safest not to sub.
ject II to the test of bacon and beans /
Many n friendship under such test
has gone a glimmering. The test of n
camp is no better than those of so
ciety; II Is only different. The con
ditions of camp life are simple. whole
some and unconventional. but they
are not ON that account any easier for
he man from town. He may be able
% fully enjoy life when his linen Is
ipotless and his trousers are well
'reased, while better or a worse man
nay find good clothes lrksome.
Some men are as Incapable of enjoy.
ng camp life as some good business
men would be OF writing poetry.
But, full allowance being made for the ,
Exceptions, camping trip Is "A
mighty good thing to develop the stun
hat Is in a man. Some men are ut !
erly selfish and others utterly useless !
n camp. II a trip Is 10 be a success !
IS a camping trip, a great deal must y
'e done. The work usually falls 10 "
zee lot of two or three. while
he others cucumber the camp with IL
heir presence. II would be amusing y
II were not disgusting to see the n
tier collapse in dignity and starch Ia
less OF men who In town lecture and III
ondescend 10 their friends and bully. W
~ their acquaintances. Those who W
re never III in the city may become be
inyalids in camp, annoyed
y every insect that crawls. The n,
ost common phenomenon of the be
mp is that those who are best n,
hooled in the amenities Of life are
1t to become coarse, vulgar and al "a
ost indecent in language and table In
anners. A man who viii mlnce gr
.er his restaurant meal with the
Getty OF a dyspeptic may In camp. m,
nply gobble mp everything In sight rs
thout regard 10 the appetltes Of his a
mpanions. He may lick mp dust or II
pectorate without regard 10 the yci
rection Of the wind and he may show "A
concern for personal cleanliness. yc,
lese are the tricks Of the novice. car
I the veteran camper out. who has =
me 10 consider the camp as tenn
rary home, in which things must be-
~ ordered to be enjoyed. The
Vice thinks that the camp Is a place
ere ones manners as well as ones
res are abandoned. he either
rms better quite speedily. or returns
me before the week is out
The camp if a commune whore men
face 10 face. II II rs pleasant. II ls
y pleasant; II not, II would better
abandoned al once