in the cool shades of the big pines; towards evening
you may wallow through snowdrifts; and at dark you may camp where
morning will show you icicles hanging from the brinks of little
waterfalls. Behind your saddle you will want to carry a sweater, or
better still a buckskin waistcoat. Your arms are never cold anyway,
and the pockets of such a waistcoat, made many and deep, are handy
receptacles for smokables, matches, cartridges, and the like. For the
night-time, when the cold creeps down from the high peaks, you should
provide yourself with a suit of very heavy underwear and an extra
sweater or a buckskin shirt. The latter is lighter, softer, and more
impervious to the wind than the sweater. Here again I wish to place
myself on record as opposed to a coat. It is a useless ornament,
assumed but rarely, and then only as substitute for a handier garment.

Inasmuch as you will be a great deal called on to handle abrading and
sometimes frozen ropes, you will want a pair of heavy buckskin
gauntlets. An extra pair of stout high-laced boots with small
Hungarian hob-nails will come handy. It is marvelous how quickly
leather wears out in the downhill friction of granite and shale. I
once found the heels of a new pair of shoes almost ground away by a
single giant-strides descent of a steep shale-covered
thirteen-thousand-foot mountain. Having no others I patched them with
hair-covered rawhide and a bit of horseshoe. It sufficed, but was a
long and disagreeable job which an extra pair would have obviated.

Balsam is practically unknown in the high hills, and the rocks are
especially hard. Therefore you will take, in addition to your gray
army-blanket, a thick quilt or comforter to save your bones. This,
with your saddle-blankets and pads as foundation, should give you
ease--if you are tough. Otherwise take a second quilt.

A tarpaulin of heavy canvas 17 x 6 feet goes under you, and can be, if
necessary, drawn up to cover your head. We never used a tent. Since
you do not have to pack your outfit on your own back, you can, if you
choose, include a small pillow. Your other personal belongings are
those you would carry into the Forest. I have elsewhere described what
they should be.

Now as to the equipment for your horses.

The most important point for yourself is your riding-saddle. The
cowboy or military style and seat are the only practicable ones.
Perhaps of these two the cowboy saddle is the better, for the