by Nessmuk Woodcraft is dedicated to the Grand Army of "Outers," as a pocket volume of reference on woodcraft.     For brick and mortar breed filth and crime, With a pulse of evil that throbs and beats;     And men are withered before their prime By the curse paved in with the lanes and streets.     And lungs are poisoned and shoulders bowed, In the smothering reek of mill and mine;     And death stalks in on the struggling crowd— But he shuns the shadow of oak and pine. —Nessmuk...

IT does not need that Herbert Spencer should cross the ocean to tell us that we are an over-worked nation; that our hair turns gray ten years earlier than the Englishman's; or, "that we have had somewhat too much of the gospel of work," and, "it is time to preach the gospel of relaxation." It is all true. But we work harder, accomplish more in a given time and last quite as long as slower races. As to the gray hair— perhaps gray hair is better than none; and it is a fact that the average Briton

THE clothing, blanket-bag and shelter-cloth are all that need be described in that line. The next articles that I look after are knapsack (or pack basket), rod with reel, lines, flies, hooks and all my fishing gear, pocket-axe, knives and tinware. Firstly, the knapsack; as you are apt to carry it a great many miles, it is well to have it right and easy-fitting at the start. Don't be induced to carry a pack basket. I am aware that it is in high favor all through the Northern Wilderness and is als

WITH a large majority of prospective tourists and outers, "camping out" is a leading factor in the summer vacation. And during the long winter months they are prone to collect in little knots and talk much of camps, fishing, hunting and "roughing it." The last phrase is very popular and always cropping out in the talks on matters pertaining to a vacation in the woods. I dislike the phrase. We do not go to the green woods and crystal waters to rough it, we go to smooth it. We get it rough enough

HARDLY second in importance to a warm, dry camp, is the campfire. In point of fact, the warmth, dryness and healthfulness of a forest camp are mainly dependent on the way the fire is managed and kept up. No asthmatic or consumptive patient ever regained health by dwelling in a close, damp tent. I once camped for a week in a wall tent, with a Philadelphia party, and in cold weather. We had a little sheet iron fiend, called a camp-stove. When well fed with bark, knots and chips, it would get red h

THERE is probably no subject connected with outdoor sport so thoroughly and exhaustively written up as Fly-fishing and all that pertains thereto. Fly-fishing for speckled trout always, and deservedly, takes the lead. Bass fishing usually comes next, though some writers accord second place to the lake trout, salmon trout or land-locked salmon. The mascalonge, as a game fish, is scarcely behind the small-mouthed bass and is certainly more gamy than the lake trout. The large-mouthed bass and picker

THE way in which an average party of summer outers will contrive to manage—or mismanage—the camp and campfire so as to get the greatest amount of smoke and discontent at the least outlay of time and force, is something past all understanding and somewhat aggravating to an old woodsman who knows some better. But it is just as good fun as the cynical O.W. can ask, to see a party of three or four enthusiastic youngsters organize the camp on the first day in, and proceed to cook the first meal. Of c

We may live without friends, we may live without books, But civilized man cannot live without cooks. IT is probably true that nothing connected with outdoor life in camp is so badly botched as the cooking. It is not through any lack of the raw material, which may be had of excellent quality in any country village. It is not from lack of intelligence or education, for the men you meet in the woods, as outers or sportsmen, are rather over than under the average in these respects. Perhaps it is bec

ABOUT the only inducements I can think of for making a ten days' journey through a strong wilderness, solitary and alone, were a liking for adventure, intense love of nature in her wildest dress, and a strange fondness for being in deep forests by myself. The choice of route was determined by the fact that two old friends and school-mates had chosen to cast their lots in Michigan, one near Saginaw Bay, the other among the pines of the Muskegon. And both were a little homesick, and both wrote fre

THE canoe is coming to the front and canoeing is gaining rapidly in popular favor, in spite of the disparaging remark that "a canoe is a poor man's yacht." The canoe editor of Forest and Stream pertinently says, "we may as properly call a bicycle 'the poor man's express train'." But, suppose it is the poor man's yacht? Are we to be debarred from aquatic sports because we are not rich? And are we such weak flunkies as to be ashamed of poverty? Or to attempt shams and subterfuges to hide it? For m

THE oft-recurring question as to where to go for the outing, can hardly be answered at all satisfactorily. In a general way, any place may, and ought to be, satisfactory, where there are fresh green woods, pleasant scenery, and fish and game plenty enough to supply the camp abundantly, with boating facilities and pure water. "It's more in the man than it is in the land," and there are thousands of such places on the waters of the Susquehanna, the Delaware, the rivers and lakes of Maine, Michigan