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THE BIBCHES 



Theke are fn all some thirty-five members of 

 the birch family. Of the nine American spe- 

 cies, Nature has with seeming favoritism placed 

 six of them east of the Eocky Mountains. They 

 are as a rule quick-growing, short-lived trees 

 with a wide variety of uses. 



The birch served the Indian for countless pur- 

 poses. He drank the sap, and boiled it into 

 sirup. He made boxes, buckets, baskets, and 

 canoes from its bark. Strips of bark, rolled 

 closely, made him a good torch. Small oblong 

 pieces, with strange figfures drawn upon them, 

 served him as playing cards. The lodges were 

 covered with sheets of birch bark. The papoose 

 was cradled in it, and one northwestern tribe, 

 the Liloots, wrapped their dead in shrouds of 

 it, and lined their graves with the same mate- 

 rial. Scrolls of birch bark may still be found 

 among some tribes whereon "medicine songs" 

 are inscribed in picture writing. They also 

 wrote their "picture letters" on birch bark. 



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