100 TREE ANCESTORS 



We owe the discovery of the Mississippi to its use, and it would be 

 a safe assertion that the settlement of much of this country with 

 its intricate systems of rivers and lakes would otherwise have been 

 impossible. In Hiawatha we read the mythical account of the 

 first birchbark canoe and Longfellow there describes the actual 

 process of building with accuracy. Bark canoes are still made in 

 the backwoods by trappers and Indians, and around some of the 

 lake resorts, and the wood because of the inherited tradition as 

 well as because of its intrinsic worth is similarly used by canoe and 

 small boat manufacturers. 



For the manifold uses of birch wood of the various species I 

 must refer the reader to the special literature of forestry — that half 

 a billion board feet are cut by saw mills in the United States each 

 year is an index of its commercial position. For two centuries, 

 and from Maine to Tennessee, much of the finest birch disappeared 

 before the pioneer's axe without any realization of its value other 

 than for fuel. Our most valuable commercial species is probably 

 the sweet or cherry birch {Betula lento) although the various species 

 are often indiscriminately mixed in lumbering. Indians from time 

 immemorable have made birch beer by fermenting its sugary sap, 

 which is copious. Inhabitants throughout its range still utiHze 

 the sap in this way, although birch beer can scarcely be said to be 

 an article of commerce. The sweet birch was also the first of the 

 birches whose value was recognized, and the wood was exported 

 to Britain as early as 1791. It enters largely into cabinet and 

 furniture making, into musical instruments, interior finish, boats, 

 bilHard cues, mallets, Indian clubs, wooden ware, and from the 

 time of the first cabinet makers it has been a substitute for cherry 

 or mahogany — and a most admirable one. 



CXir other birches, aside from the uses of the bark of the paper 

 birch, were not recognized as valuable until much later, although 

 the yellow birch {Betula lutea) has been an article of commerce for 

 over one hundred years, going into wooden ware, furniture, ve- 

 hicles, etc. The paper birch goes into clothes pins, toothpicks, 

 woodenware, novelties and cooperage — its largest use being prob- 

 ably the result of the possession of the exacting quahties required 



