CAMP LIFE. 297 



preserve them over a month. They should be packed in 

 barrels with layers of bark between, and will prove more 

 edible than when simply smoked ; by smoking they may 

 be kept for years, and the fisherman long have the proud 

 pleasure of offering to friend at breakfast a little of the 

 salmon he killed and smoked himself the previous Sum- 

 mer in Canada. 



In warm weather, fish merely salted cannot be kept 

 long, and pickling in brine utterly destroys their flavor ; 

 but if the latter method must be adopted, a pickle of two 

 parts salt and one part common brown sugar will keep 

 them forever. Before cooking, however, they should be 

 well soaked. Pickling in vinegar with a few cloves is 

 probably the best mode where it is possible. ~ 



The gum for mending the canoes — and it is surprising 

 how large a hole it will fill — is made of one part rosin 

 to three parts balsam gum, fused together. If tie aper- 

 ture is very extensive, a piece- of linen saturated with* 

 melted gum should be applied. In New Brunswick and 

 Maine it is usual to mix rosin and grease, which answers 

 every purpose. 



To smoke fish, it is necessary to salt them in a tub, 

 where they can form a brine, and leave them thus for 

 three days, and then hang them in a smoke-house, not 

 too near the fire, for as many more, when they are to be 

 packed in layers, separate. Fish are soused by being 

 partially boiled, and having vinegar boiled in copper 

 kettles mixed with allspice and poured over them. Iron 

 turns the vinegar black, and hence this mode cannot be 

 pursued in the woods. Small fish may be headed, 

 cleaned and packed in a jar, which is then filled up with 



13* 



