306 Art of Travel,
Proceedings,' vol. ii., to which I refer those who care to inquire further into the matter. Cases where each man or horse carries a number of rations intermediate to those specified in the Table, are, perhaps, too complicated for use without much previous practice. It would be easy for a leader to satisfy himself that he was making no mistake, and to drill his men to any one of the tabulated cases, by planting a row of sticks, 50 yards apart, to represent the successive halting-places of his intended journey, and by making his men go through a sham rehearsal of what they would severally have to do. Then each man's duties could be written down in a schedule and all possibility of mistake be avoided.
The Table represents the proceedings of four men (or horses and men), who leave camp. Two turn back at Pr, one more turns back at P2i and the remaining man pushes on to P3, Food has been cached for him both at P2 and P,; but to make matters doubly sure, a relief party, as shown by the dotted line, can be sent to meet him at P2.
In Case A, each man carries if day's rations.
„ B, (or horse) „ 3J days' rations for himself (and drivers). „ C, „ 5f
We will take the case C as an example. The figures that refer to it are in the lines adjacent to the letter C in the Table. They are those in the uppermost line, and also those in the line up the left-hand side of the diagram, and they stand for days' journey and for days respectively. P, is reached after 12 day's travel, P2 after 3 days, P3 after 6 days from camp. The entire party might consist of 5 men, 2 carts (one a very light one), and four horses, together with one saddle and bridle. The heavier cart and 2 men and 2 horses would turn back at P1. One of the two horses of the second cart would be saddled and ridden back by a third man from P2i and, finally, the remaining cart, single horse, and 2 men, would turn back, after 6 days, from P3.-The relief party would originally consist of the first cart and 3 horses. On arriving at P,, a horse and man would be sent back. At P2 it would have more than enough spare rations to admit of its waiting two whole days for the exploring cart,. if it were necessary to do so.
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