42 A TASTE OF MAINE BIRCH. 
are free to every comer. The whole equipment of the 
camp lies folded in it, and comes forth at the beck of. 
the woodman’s axe; tent, waterproof roof, boat, camp 
utensils, buckets, cups, plates, spoons, napkins, table- 
cloths, paper for letters or your journal, torches, can- 
dles, kindling-wood, and fuel. The canoe-birch yields 
you its vestments with the utmost liberality. Ask for 
its coat, and it gives you its waistcoat also. Its bark 
seems wrapped about it layer upon layer, and comes 
off with great ease. We saw many rude structures 
and cabins shingled and sided with it, and haystacks 
capped with it. Near a maple-sugar camp there was 
a large pile of birch-bark sap-buckets, —each bucket 
made of a piece of bark about a yard square, folded 
up as the tinman folds up a sheet of tin to make a 
square vessel, the corners bent around against the 
sides and held bya wooden pin. When, one day, we 
were overtaken by a shower in traveling through the 
woods, our guide quickly stripped large sheets of the 
bark from a near tree, and we had each a perfect 
umbrella as by magic. When the rain was over, and 
we moved on, [ wrapped mine about me like a large 
leather apron, and it shielded my clothes from the wet 
bushes. When we came to a spring, Uncle Nathan 
would have a birch-bark cup ready before any of us 
could get a tin one out of his knapsack, and I think 
water never tasted so sweet as from one of these bark 
cups. It is exactly the thing. It just fits the mouth, 
and it seems to give new virtues to the water. It 
makes me thirsty now when I think of it. In our 
camp at Moxie we made a large birch-bark box to 
keep the butter in ; and the butter in this box, covered 
with some leafy boughs, I think improved in flavor 
day by day. Maine butter needs something to mollify 

