Interior of British North America. 69 



56. Hesperiphona vespertina. 



The authors of the ' Fauna Bor.-Am.' were mistaken in con- 

 sidering the Evening Grosbeak as a summer visitor to the 

 Saskatchawan. The fact is, it only inhabits that region during 

 the winter season, and was not observed by me subsequent to 

 the 22nd of April ; its breeding-country must consequently be 

 far to the north, whence it arrived at Fort Carlton in the 

 middle of November. The four specimens recorded ('Ibis,' 

 vol. iv. pp. 5 & 6) were shot in a grove of maple-trees just out- 

 side the stockades of Fort Carlton. The maple is by no means 

 a common tree on the Saskatchawan, one species only, the Ash- 

 leaved {Acer fraxinifolium), reaching so far north and west. 

 It is found in small groves in sheltered situations in the river 

 valley, and these places are resorted to in the spring by the 

 Indian women for the purpose of sugar-making. This operation 

 is carried on in a very primitive manner, the tree being simply 

 notched, and a piece of wood driven in just below the notch, to 

 lead the sap, from the end of which it drips into little pannikins 

 of birch bark laid at the foot of the tree to receive it. These 

 are visited once or twice a day, according to the yield, which 

 depends very much on the weather, frosty nights and warm days 

 being the best. The syrup thus collected being boiled down 

 in kettles, sugar is produced in the form of a hard cake — very 

 pleasant to eat by itself, but nothing to be compared to cane- 

 sugar in its sweetening property. The maples commenced to 

 " run," or rather drip, on the 28th of March — the spring (1858 

 — a rather early one) that I resided at Fort Carlton. Any un- 

 usually cold weather occurring will put a stop to the flow of sapj 

 and cause lamentations among the old Indian squaws. But to 

 return to the Grosbeaks : both species, the Evening [H. vespertina) 

 and the Pine {Pinicola canadensis), were to be found, on and off^ 

 in small parties in the maple-trees I have mentioned, near Fort 

 Carlton, during the whole winter; but the former were never as 

 numerous as the latter. They appeared to feed alike on the 

 seeds of the maple. For some days early in March, I lost 

 sight of my friends ; but on the 14th I was again allowed the 

 gratifying sight of a flock of about five-and-tweuty Evening 

 Grosbeaks, which I took to be some that had wintered more to the 

 south, and were merely passing on their northward journey, 



