138 THE BOOK OF FORESTRY 



or four spouts. The average tree will yield from 

 twenty-five to thirty gallons of sap in a good season, 

 from which two quarts of syrup or four pounds of 

 sugar will be produced. 



While maple syrup and sugar are common enough 

 throughout the northeastern States, the undiluted article 

 is rarely found in the city store, and only those who 

 have attended a sugaring-oif party in the "bush" where 

 maple goodies are made by pouring the boiling sap 

 upon the snow to cool, can realize the real sugar flavor. 

 Under such circumstances the taste excels most of the 

 confections sold in shops. 



Paper-making. While the story of how paper is made 

 may not have the same interest attached to it as haa 

 something good to eat, nevertheless the manufacture of 

 paper stock for magazines and books from forest trees 

 constitutes an interesting chapter in the story of the 

 forest. 



While paper was made from many kinds of fibrous 

 matter by the Chinese at a very early date, the 

 vegetable kingdom seems to have supplied the bulk of 

 the writing material from the very beginning. In fact 

 the word paper is derived from "papyrus," the name 

 of a reed which grew in the delta country of Egypt. The 

 earliest paper of which there is record is that used by 

 the Arabs in the ninth century and some very interest- 

 ing manuscripts written on paper of that period are still 

 in existence. This paper was made of the wood of the 

 cotton plant which was reduced to a pulp by a process 

 discovered by the Chinese and learned from them by 

 the Arabs. 



Paper was used in England commencing about the 

 fourteenth century but for a long time was made from 

 rags and scraps of parchment. This rag paper made 



