60 



January the juice flows best, beginning sometimes as early as 

 three p.m., and It dwindles away as the v/arm days of March 

 come. If the cultivator begins too early, he will lose In 

 quality and quantity as much as he will gain by extending the 

 tapping season. But high prices begin in October, and there 

 are not many who can resist the temptation of running into the 

 market with their premature produee. 



So much then for tapping. The next process is the boil- 

 ing, and this cultivator does for himself, and usually within 

 the limits of the grove. IVithout boiling, the juice speedily 

 ferments and becomes useless ; but once boildd down into 

 molasses, it may be kept for very longd periods. The juice 

 is, therefore, boiled at once in large pots placed on a per- 

 forated dome, beneath which a strong wood fire is kept burning, 

 the pared leaves of the trees being used among other f ugl . The 

 juice, which was at first brilliant and liquid, becomes now a 

 dark brown, half viscid, half solid mass, which is called 

 "gur" (molasses), and when it is still warm, it is easily 

 poured from the boiling pan into the earthen pots in which it 

 is ordinarily keit. 



As it takes from seven to ten seers of juice to produee 

 one seer of molasses, we can calculate the amount of molasses 

 which an ordinarily good tree can produee in a season. We 

 may count four and a half months for the tapping season, or 

 about 67 tapping nights. These at 5 seers each produce 335 

 seers of juice, Vi^hich will give about 40 seers of molasses. 



