hat we could
hardly sleep.

As every traveler knows, the natives of a country usually have
developed the best possible clothes and dwellings for the peculiar
conditions under which they live. Just as the Mongol felt-covered
_yurt_ and tent are all that can be desired, so do they know that
fur and leather are the only clothing to keep them warm during the
bitter winter months.

In the carts we had an ample supply of flour, bacon, coffee, tea,
sugar, and dried fruit. For meat, we depended upon our guns, of
course, and always had as much as could be used. Although we did not
travel _de luxe_, nevertheless we were entirely comfortable. When a
man boasts of the way in which he discards even necessaries in the
field, you can be morally certain that he has not done much real
traveling. "Roughing it" does not harmonize well with hard work. One
must accept enough discomforts under the best conditions without the
addition of any which can be avoided. Good health is the prime
requisite in the field. Without it you are lost. The only way in
which to keep fit and ready to give every ounce of physical and
mental energy to the problems of the day is to sleep comfortably,
eat wholesome food, and be properly clothed. It is not often, then,
that you will need a doctor. We have not as yet had a physician on
any of our expeditions, even though we have often been very many
miles from the nearest white men.

It never ceases to amuse me that the insurance companies always
cancel my accident policies as soon as I leave for the field. The
excuse is that I am not a "good risk," although they are ready
enough to renew them when I return to New York. And yet the average
person has a hundred times more chance of being killed or injured
right on Fifth Avenue than do we who live in the open, breathing
God's fresh air and sleeping under the stars. My friend Stefansson,
the Arctic explorer, often says that "adventures are a mark of
incompetence," and he is doubtless right. If a man goes into the
field with a knowledge of the country he is to visit and with a
proper equipment, he probably will have very few "adventures." If he
has not the knowledge and equipment he had much better remain at
home, for he will inevitably come to grief.

We learned from the Mongols that there was a wonderful shooting
ground three hundred miles southwest of Urga in the country
belonging to Sain Noin Khan. It was a region backed by mountains
fifteen thousand feet in h