MAPLE SUGAR MAKING. 



Few rural occupations possess the charm that sugar 

 making does; there is a picturesqueness and poetry about 

 it surpassing that of any other branch of industry ; and 

 no man who had in boyhood the blessed privilege of 

 spending a few weeks each year at its rugged and 

 healthful tasks can ever think of the sugar bush with- 

 out having his heart leap with a quicker bound. If 

 ever the mind of the imaginative boy drinks in the 

 sweet and tender influences of nature, that are to make 

 broader and better and more enjoyable his later years, 

 it is during these few weeks of wild, free life of work 

 and play in the woods. 



In some of the counties of 'New York and New Eng- 

 land, where rock maples abound, farmers tap from one 

 hundred to one thousand trees each — sometimes even 

 as many as five thousand. The sugar season extends 

 over a period of three to six weeks. If the spring be 

 an early one, a few men may tap a portion of their 

 trees the latter part of February, that they may obtain 

 a " gilt-edge " price for their product, as sugar made 

 early is clearer and whiter than that made later in the 

 season ; but generally the sugar makers wait until after 



