70 AN ACCOUNT or tut 
The fap flows into wooden troughs from which it 
is carried and poured into ftore troughs or large cifterns 
inthe fhape ofa canoe orlarge manger made of white afh, 
linden, bafs wood, or white pine, from which it is conveyed to 
the kettle in which it is to be boiled. Thefe cifterns as well 
as the kettle are generally covered by a fhed to defend the 
fapfrom therain. The fugar isimproved by ftraining the 
fap through a blanket or cloth, either before or after itis 
half boiled. ,Butter, hogs lard or tallow are added to the 
{ap in the kett e to prevent its boiling over, and lime, eggs 
or new-milk are mixed with it in ordertoclarify it. Ihave 
feen clear fugar made without the addition of either of them. 
A {poonfull of flacked lime, the white of one egg and a 
pint of new-milk are the ufual proportions of thefe articles 
which are mixed with fifteen gallons of fap. In fome 
famples which [ have lately feen of maple-fugar clarified 
with each of the above articles, that in which milk alone 
was ufed, had an evident fuperiority in point of colour. 
The fugar after being fufficiently boiled, is grained and 
clayedand afterwards refined, or converted into loaf fugar. 
The methods of conducting each of thefe proceffes is fo 
nearly the fame with thofe which are ufed in the manu- 
factory of Weft-India fugar, and are fo generally known, 
that I need not fpendany time in defcribing them. 
It has been a fubje& of inquiry whitherthe maple fugar 
might not be improved in its quality and encreafed in its 
quantity by the eftablifhment of boiling houfes in the fu- 
gar maple country to be conduéted by affociated labor. 
From the fcattered fituation of the trees, the difficulty of 
carrying the fap to a great diflance, and from the many ex- 
penfes which muftaccrue from fupporting labourers and 
horfes in the woods in a feafon of the year in which nature 
affords no fuftenance to man or beaft, I am difpofed to be- 
lieve that the moft productive method both in quantity and 
profit of obtaining this fugar will be by the labor of private 
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