It ain't wood. If people want to keep a woodpile dry, they stack it off the ground and throw a tarp over it. They don't put it in a canvas bag and leave it out under open sky.
I'm for slabs of smoked bacon. It's smoked and dried and it'll keep so long as the critters stay out of it.
I always assumed that it was a bear bag, to keep the bears out of their fresh food, but someone on the big board said it wasn't high enough, black bears could climb a tree a hundred feet high, and that those little thin poles weren't about to keep a bear out.
But then again, the camp tender was never going to leave camp, so it's not like the campsite would ever be left unsupervised.
I vote bear bag.
P.S. When hiking in grizzly bear country, we too, wore bear bells to warn the bears we were coming. Of course, our trail guide said bears already knew humans could be sources of food - human and otherwise - and sometimes the bear bells just
attracted bears. It was like ringing the dinner bell.