48 The Maple Family, [Jan. 



THE MAPLE FAMILY. 



Who does not love the Maples. Who does not regard them 

 with favor. If they are not known in song, they are still thought 

 of for their substantial good in the fire-side comforts they bring, 

 for their ample shades and symmetrical forms, for their straight 

 limbs, and fair proportions. In the fields they spread their arms 

 wide, and give clean shelter to the herds- which feed there; in 

 the forest they rise majestically, and stand strong and upright, 

 and rank with the tallest trees. Their gray ridgy trunks lend 

 age to the w^ood, while they lighten up the sombre scene. They 

 see ten generations of men laid in their graves ere their strength 

 begins to wane. 



They form an harmonious family, whose likenesses are easily 

 caught by the practiced eye, but they do not all seek the same 

 kind of life. Some like the wet and marshy spots, some the dry 

 hill side, but far below the mountain top. Others love the north- 

 ern air, and others still the shady glen and rocky mountain pass. 

 It is thus that each seeks light or shade, the plains or hills, the 

 wet or dry, and yet each kind is maple-like. Some too are 

 small, others large, but the kind is not lost whether great or 

 small The first among the kinds is the sugar maple, (acer saccha- 

 rinura.) No tree is better known, and it is the type of the fami- 

 ly. It has a wide range, being found growing in the latitude of 

 44, 1500 feet above the level of the sea, and yet in some places, 

 spring frosts kill the tree in the state of New York. It is found 

 in groves, where, with the Beech, they tenant together the whole 

 field, they are associates in possession. New York New England 

 and the middle states, are the most famous for their Sugar Maples. 

 The whole region, except some of the highest in New York, is 

 quite favorable to the growth of this tree. It here attains the 

 height of 80 feet, and sometimes a diameter of four feet. Its 

 bark is smooth when young, but becomes rough and ritlgy with 

 age. Its branches in the fields are numerous and widely spread; 

 while in the forest, where light and air comes in from above, it 

 rises high, and seems ambitious to overtop its neighbors. It is 

 here too that in spring it gives its juice for sugar in itj greatest 

 abundance. It may be expected that an ordinary tree will yield 

 from fifty to eighty gallons; four gallons of sap will make a pound 

 of sugar. When the sap is concentrated by evaporation in per- 

 fectly clean vessels, and kept from the dirt and dust, it crystal izes 

 in yellowish brown crystals, which are sharp and well defined. 

 It only requires care to make a white sugar, which shall rival in 

 color and taste the sugar of the cane. There is no mystery in 

 the manufacture of pure sugar from the maple] it only requires 



