152 BERTHA'S VISIT TO HER 



friends, the Miss Maudes' visit ; fortunately it 

 has been very fine, for they wished to walk 

 through the forest ; and we did ramble very far. 

 We took them fo visit the blind basket-maker and 

 the Franklins, and shewed them all the improve- 

 ments that my uncle had made in the cottage ; 

 and we came home by a round-about way through 

 an oak coppice, in which there are nice glades and 

 pretty paths. In one of these glades there was 

 an immense pile of oak bark ; and Miss Maude 

 told me that in May it is peeled off the young 

 trees which are cut down in thinning the wood, 

 and is piled up in stacks to dry, till the latter end 

 of Autumn, when it is disposed of by weight. For 

 this purpose there was a huge pair of scales, set 

 up near the stack, and on this very day they 

 began to take it down, to weigh it, and pack it 

 in large mats, made of a kind of bent grass, in 

 which it is sewed up, and sold to the tanners at 

 a very high price. The different groups, some 

 weighing, some packing, and others taking it 

 away on drays, made a very lively scene and 

 Miss Maude and I each made a sketch of it. 



While we were drawing, she asked me several 

 questions about the Brazilian forests, and I en- 

 deavoured to describe to her the richness of 

 foliage, and the majestic height of the trees, to 

 which none here can be compared. I did not 

 forget the great variety in our Brazil woods, 

 where almost every tree was different from that 



