1902 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



341 



was that the snow was too deep, so they 

 could not get to the church. I asked sever- 

 al if they ever found a snow too deep to get 

 to the one saloon. All agreed that never a 

 Sunday had passed without there being a 

 well-beaten path to its front door. 



After Sunday-school my heart was re- 

 joiced again by two pieces of information. 

 P^irst, the saloon was to be removed; in fact, 

 the fixtures were already sold. Second, 

 the reason of its removal was that it did 

 not pay expenses. Oh what an easy way 

 this would be to settle that vexed question 

 that is now stirring the whole wide world 

 — saloon or no saloons! If the proprietors 

 could just be made to pick up their duds 

 and leave because of lack of patronage, 

 what a deal of quarreling and hard feeling 

 might be saved! 



Well, it was arranged that, after Sunday- 

 school, I was to get my dinner over at the 

 sugar-camp. I told Mrs. Hilbert in the 

 morning all the dinner I wanted was some 

 Russet potatoes roasted in the ashes, and 

 some milk to drink while I ate them. Of 

 course, we had bread and butter, and ma- 

 ple S3'rup as a side issue, and a very good 

 dinner it was. When I told friend Hilbert 

 that, as I had spent the forenoon worship- 

 ing God, I should like to help a part of the 

 afternoon in saving the sap from wasting, 

 he said he did not know any thing I could 

 do unless it was to sit on a high stool and 

 boss the ranch. I told him I used to be am- 

 bitious when I was young, but I had gotten 

 over it. I asked for a light tin pail and a 

 tin dipper that they could spare as well as 

 not. I told. Alice, after she had cleared 

 away the dinner-table, to come and help 

 me. The greater part of the immense ma- 

 ple-trees had two buckets, but usually only 

 one bucket was running over, so we dipped 

 sap with our dippers into pails that were 

 not quite full. At many of the small trees 

 the pails were only half full; and we car- 

 ried sap from the pails that were running 

 over, into these. The cistern was full of 

 sap; the store-troughs were full, and the 

 boilers were going at such a rate that one 

 or another of the six or eight was boiling 

 over most of the time. The plan I was 

 working on was about the only one to save 

 the wasting sap. Three teams were gath- 

 ering — that is, as fast as the boiling would 

 permit them to gather. When we had stop- 

 ped sap wasting, by equalizing as far as 

 we could go, we followed after the gather- 

 ing-tank and took a dipperful or two from 

 the pails running over, and carried it to 

 the pails that had just been emptied. 



By the middle of the afternoon, as there 

 was no sap going to waste I started off 

 crosslots in the direction of that "cabin in 

 the woods." I was a little tired when I 

 reached it, for you know I was a little out 

 of practice in climbing those great hills; 

 but when I opened the door of our little 

 home and found every thing in apple-pie 

 order, just exactly as we had left it last 

 November, I once more knelt down and 

 thanked God for his great mercies on that 



little home. Nobody had meddled with any 

 thing. As there is no smoke or dust in that 

 out-of-the-way place, even the cheese-cloth 

 screens over the windows were just as clean 

 and perfect as the day Mrs. Root put them 

 up. Finally my eye rested on a big stout 

 chest, where our most valuable articles of 

 clothing, etc., were, as we supposed, most 

 securely locked with a strong double-bolt 

 lock. Sure enough, the broaid plank that 

 made the cover had warped during the win- 

 ter, and by some unexplained means had 

 sprung open that strong lock. The cover 

 was opened just wide enough for a mouse 

 to crawl under — yes, and they did crawl 

 under. Mrs. Root had placed in this box 

 for safet3' a bag of crackers, some granose 

 flakes, and part of a sack of flour. The 

 mice had got in and held a picnic there all 

 winter. A very comfortable and stj'lish 

 nest had been made inside of her Sunday 

 hat, and the piano spread that we used on 

 our little round diniug-table had furnished 

 some very soft and appropriate material for 

 said nest. Luckily, however, these were 

 the deer mice of the woods, and hence there 

 was no smell about their work as with the 

 common house mice. God in his infinite 

 wisdom has seen fit to send us, all along, 

 thorns with the roses; and while I felt sad 

 about this mishap I could thank him all 

 the same. It took me till dark — in fact, I 

 had to light a lamp to finish taking every 

 thing out of the chest and shaking and 

 brushing it to restore things to order. 

 Then I found I had to go a quarter of a 

 mile to get some milk, eggs, and bread and 

 butter, etc., for my evening meal. I was 

 so tired when night came that I curled up 

 under my warm woolen blanket on my rus- 

 tic bed up by that little stove I told you 

 about last fall, with a keen appreciation of 

 a warm cosy place to rest. Yes, I was tired 

 after my busy Sabbath day's work; but I 

 was happy — yes, very happy. 



Shortly before this trip I have been tell- 

 ing you about, our pastor, Rev. Jessie Hill, 

 gave us a sermon, using the text I have at 

 the head of this chapter. From this sermon 

 I make the following extract: 



Worry is not the most cominon sin among the very 

 poor. They possess a stoicism and indifference that 

 makes them indifferent to their condition. But worry 

 is a/aw/Zzar face among those who own larders anS 

 wardrobes. We account for this on the basis th t as a 

 man goes up in the scale of being, his wants become 

 more numerous. In most cases the multiplicity of 

 wants is the badge of civilization. A jelly-fish finds 

 food in the seaweed which grows in the decayed tis- 

 sues of its own organism. Its wants are few. But its 

 life is among the lowest form of animal life. 



But we have magnified the complexity of modern 

 life by elaborating what God intended to be simple. 

 Eating was intended to be the soul of simplicity A 

 very little food prepared in a very simple waj' is all 

 that is necessary for healthy life. But now, unless we 

 have a dozen spoons, several forks and knives, half a 

 dozen side dishes be.side each plate, we haven't had 

 any thing to eat ; and a mother testified the other day: 

 " I might as well run a private sanitarium. We have 

 five dilTerent sorts of health food and three kinds of 

 cocoa in the pantry; and the cook, who is justly proud 

 of her hot bread aiid her cofT e, is los ng all patience 

 with us. ' Sure, and they are getting so that hot wa- 

 ther'U be too sthrong for thim,' I heard her say to the 

 hou emaid yesterday. ' 'Tis a sick-diet kitchen this is 

 coming to be, and no place for a g .irr) that can make 

 eliven kinds of cake.' " 



