184 
THE MAINE WOODS. 
nothing of the dark and savage, only the mild and in¬ 
fantile. The sentiments of humility and reverence 
chiefly were expressed. 
It was a dense and damp spruce and fir wood in which 
we lay, and, except for our fire, perfectly dark ; and when 
I awoke in the night, I either heard an owl from deeper 
in the forest behind us, or a loon from a distance over 
the lake. Getting up some time after midnight to col¬ 
lect the scattered brands together, while my companions 
were sound asleep, I observed, partly in the fire, which had 
ceased to blaze, a perfectly regular elliptical ring of light, 
about five inches in its shortest diameter, six or seven in 
its longer, and from one eighth to one quarter of an inch 
wide. It was fully as bright as the fire, but not reddish 
or scarlet like a coal, but a white and slumbering light, 
like the glowworm’s. I could tell it from the fire only 
by its whiteness. I saw at once that it must be phospho¬ 
rescent wood, which I had so often heard of, but never 
chanced to see. Putting my finger on it, with a little hes¬ 
itation, I found that it was a piece of dead moose-wood 
(Acer striatum) which the Indian had cut off in a slanting 
direction the evening before. Using my knife, I discov¬ 
ered that the light proceeded from that portion of the 
sap-wood immediately under the bark, and thus presented 
a regular ring at the end, which, indeed, appeared raised 
above the level of the wood, and when I pared off the 
bark and cut into the sap, it was all aglow along the log. 
I was surprised to find the wood quite hard and appar¬ 
ently sound, though probably decay had commenced in 
the sap, and I cut out some little triangular chips, and 
placing them in the hollow of my hand, carried them 
into the camp, waked my companion, and showed them 
to him. They lit up the inside of my hand, revealing 
