CHAPTER IV.

ACCOUTREMENTS CONTINUED.-CAP-A-PIED.

Coat, Pantaloons, Knapsack, Hat, Stick, and Gloves.

42.

OST men are accustomed to wear a frockcoat, and beyond all question it is the neatest, and, under ordinary circumstances, the best style of coat, and therefore, though we shall take occasion to suggest another kind as presenting, on the whole, more advantages for the traveller, yet we do not mean to say anything against the frock-coat as such. Colonel Shaw recommends it: :"For a coat nothing is so good as a surtout, made of the finest cloth; it should button up close to the neck to avoid cold." This requires, however, from its limited accommodation in the pocket way, the use of a knapsack for stowing away your linen and general travelling baggage in case you are going to exceed two or three days. What we are going to recommend will carry three days' change, &c. without encumbering you in your tour. your tour. We mean the adop

tion of

43. A Shooting Jacket as being capitally suited for walking in-fine or wet, windy or frosty. There are

many kinds of material now introduced, such as the plaids and similar manufactures, any of which will keep you warm enough in winter, or, in summer, as cool as can be accomplished, consistently with anything like provision against showers of rain and windy weather. The velveteen is the most durable for wear; there is no end, in fact, to such a jacket; the colour varies, the lighter colours have the advantage of freedom from smell, to which, particularly when wet, the black dye is always necessarily liable. On the whole we are inclined to think the plaid jackets the best, all reasons considered. You don't get so soon chilled by wind or wet in this woollen* as you do in the cotton (velveteen) article. This remark, of course, does not apply to any such luxurious dress as velvet itself, which is silk, and no doubt unexceptionable save on the score of expense— to some a matter of inferior moment. It would be foreign to the direct object of this little treatise, were we to digress into the various scientific reasons for every suggestion. Most readers know that the fact of an article being a conductor or non-conductor of caloric and electricity, regulates the choice of its use in the variations of climate-the object generally being to keep in the animal heat by winter's clothing, and to keep out

*"Coat, waistcoat, and trousers.—In nine cases out of ten, tweed shooting costume is the best, but should be of thick, not thin material, for all except damp and tropical countries. There should be no hem to the bottom of the legs of trousers, as the wet is materially retained by one.

"Socks.-The hotter you expect the ground to be on which you have to walk, the thicker should your socks be; have plenty of woollen socks.

"Braces.-Do not despise them unless you have had abundant experience of belts, for belts do not suit every shape. If you use braces, take at least two pairs, for when they are drenched with perspiration they dry slowly."-GALTON's Art of Travel.

the heat which is external to the body in summer: the body neither relishing an external absence of heat (cold), which deprives it too rapidly of caloric by conducting away its own, nor an external presence of heat, which is so great as to equal, or by ever so little to exceed, the temperature of its own blood—that heat being oppressive to people in general which approaches blood heat. Woollen garments fulfil the greatest number of these desiderata for the body's self-defence. They do not chill the body; though they may become moist, they retain air in their interstices, and do not condense moisture.

44. Waterproof dresses have called forth considerable attention latterly, from the elaborate eulogies of various interested patentees, and the frequently trumpedup authentications as to their impervious qualities. We do not mean to deny that these may be more or less what they profess, but we do assert that a great oversight has occurred on the part of both patentees, experimenters, and the public, regarding the point, or points rather, to be kept in view. It is just because these articles, as Indian rubber, oil-silk, chemically-prepared cloth, &c. are rendered impermeable, that they are, on this very account, injurious in their use, to the health of the body. We must explain this, by going on to state, that the impermeability to external wet is not all that is required in a dress, but also a transpirability of insensible perspiration from within that requires to be kept in view-both which conditions it will probably never be practicable to accomplish thoroughly, as the article must acquire the nature of a (safety) valve, permitting escape of vapour from within-refusing the entrance of water from without. If any one has possession of such an inestimable coat, let him enjoy it; until he does get

it, let him take our word for it, that mere waterproof garments are prejudicial, for any length of wear; they may do for a short time, as during a passing shower, but not for a long walk in a settled rain. The perspiration freely generated, under strong exercise, though in an insensible form in its nascent state, is retained by the waterproof clothing, and being thereupon condensed, not only actually communicates a chill to the body, from the water so condensed inside the waterproof,* but moreover presents a source of danger to the constitution, from the fact of this condensed perspiration being a real and energetic virus, the poisonous nature of which, in developing the worst types of fever, has long been known to the medical profession. It is so subtle an agent that, although refractory as yet to the tests of the chemist, it is so active as to be detected in the short space of a few hours by our nervous system— whose precursory monitions of alarm at the self-born foe most readers may have had more or less occasion to observe, in their own personal experience of headache, languor, faintness, &c. after wearing a close-fastened waterproof coat or cloak; compared with the evil results of which, a simple good wetting, from the penetrating rain, would be an evil almost to be dignified with the name of good! We have, after all, digressed perhaps a little; but it may be of service to give this explanation for those readers who have not access to other medical discussions of the subject. The remark has a general bearing on the question of dress, and the reader can apply it in many ways if he will take the trouble. It is for this very reason, viz. on account of

* A fact which accounts for the interior of the India-rubber coats being moist after being worn some time, and which are therefore supposed to leak, but improperly.

retained perspiration, that under garments especially should be changed frequently, and washed, even if in a few days they may not appear sullied at all.

45. Further, it is for the convenient arrangement of the pockets that the shooting-jacket style is so good, for in these wallet-like recesses you can stow away what is sufficient for two or three days' tour, without needing such a thing as a knapsack. In the half-dozen pockets, too, you can so dispose symmetrically around you all your travelling chattels, as to carry them at the least expenditure of strength; and, therefore, more agreeably than when dangling about in the folds of a longskirted coat; though we do not find fault with the long tail of a frock-coat in other respects, provided your journey's length, &c. require the introduction of a wallet upon your shoulders. Another shirt, a pair or two of stockings or socks, a small case of "morning exercises," as the condensed toilet-case has been facetiously labelled, a pair of light shoes for a change at the resting-place, and an extra handkerchief or so, will generally be sufficient. A silk night-cap is no bad addition to this slender stock of usefuls, for those, especially, who are fond of lying down to take their siesta on the inviting fresh grass, under the shade of some, perhaps, "farspreading beech," when the hat can never completely be retained on the head. It forms a protection against catching cold in the head; and further, by pulling it over the ears, it will prevent insects from getting into them; for, although in the generality of cases the drum of the ear is a perfect barrier, securing the internal ear from foreign bodies, yet this is not the case in every instance, the ear having, in a certain proportion of cases, been attacked by inflammation, causing more or less destruction of its membranous drum, in which case small insects might have an opportunity of gratifying