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voi.. xxxvm. No. la. 
WHOLE No. Ift21. 1 
NEW YORK CITY, MARCH 22. 1879. 
/PRICE FIVE CENTS. 
\ **.00 PER YEAR. 
[Entered according to Act of Congress, In the year 1879, by the Rural Publishing Company, in the office of the Librarian of Congress at Washington.! 
years ago. I consider tin better than wood, 
as it is lighter, smoother, and hence more easily 
kept clean and free from sourness, and they 
do not shrink and require hooping, soaking, 
or repairing, like wood, when you are In haste 
to tap. 8ome excellent Vermont makers, how¬ 
ever, use cedar buckets, painted. 
The Spouts. 
The best spout I know of is the “Eureka 
No. 2." (See Fig. 4}). Indeed, except In one 
point, easily remedied, and which I shall prts- 
ently mention, I cannot conceive how a more 
perfect spout can be made. It is of malleable 
iron, cast and galvanized, and is exceedingly 
durable. Most of the other spouts are very per¬ 
ishable. It enters the hole in the tree, not like 
most other spouts, in form of a conical, hollow 
plug to stop the best running pores for the half 
inch of wood nearest the bark ; but in form of 
three “ flanges ” which stop almost no pores, 
and when driven tight, hold the curved portion 
of the spout up against the bark (rossed 
smooth), and prevent leakage. The sap Is not 
dammed back in the hole in the tree to sour, 
or conveyed through a long, hollow tube 
with the same result, but all ruu3 out clean 
from the tree throngh a hole at the bottom 
side of the spout, and is conducted through a 
short, smooth, open channel into the pail. This 
channel seldom sours, and then iB easily cleaned 
with a small brush or swab, without removing 
the spout from the tree. Freeness from sour¬ 
ing Is to me the most valuable of the many 
good qualities of this spout, for strictly 
prime " sirup can never he made from sap the 
least soured. For nine years I have used the 
“Eureka" side by side with evory klud of 
spout, wooden and metallic, home-made or 
offered for sale, and know it to be in this, and 
indeed in all respects, decidedly the best. 
The Covers. 
The buckets should always be covered. This, 
in proportion to the cost. Is the greatest im¬ 
provement of all. Covers exclude rain, snow, 
dirt, Insects, etc., and help to keeD the sap 
from freezing hard on eold nights, and shade 
it and help to prevent its souring on warm 
days. Excluding rain and snow i6 the main 
poiut, however. In a “camp" of 1,000 trees, 
it will savfc, during an average Ohio season 
I the boiling of about a 
best made of 1 n o 
help in gathering to 
7 their opposite sides ; 
for example, all red 
on one side and all 
‘ white ou the other. 
Then, in tapping, all 
"^" men in gathering^ 
prevents missing any 
This form of backets has the following advan¬ 
tages over the conical form: the three sizes 
adapt them to the different running capacities 
of large and small trees; if properly distribu¬ 
ted, they are worth as much as if all were of 
the largest size and cost much less and store 
better. Again, they do not stick together, or 
rust in storing, in “nests” as conical ones will, 
if packed into one another. They also hang 
inch tin; six sheets having been, as above 
said, used whole in the sides of the three 
buckets. The piece in the smallest buck¬ 
et is 3} inches wide and is cut from the 8th 6heet 
of lOx 14-tin. This leaves a piece 10x10} 
mches, and this and the two lOxlO-ineh sheets 
form the three bottoms. A }-ineh hole is 
punched just below the rim of each bucket, to 
slip over the notch in the spout or “ spile,’ 
MAPLE-SUGAR MAKING 
W. I. CHAMBERLAIN 
Improved Method and Appliance* of the Present. 
These we shall notice first, briefly, in a his¬ 
torical way, and then more at length by way 
of description. 
It was a stroke of genuine genius that hung 
the bucket on the spout. Genius discovers 
obvious things never before discovered; things 
so obvious that when pointed out, we all say, 
“ Why didn’t we think of that before ?’’ So 
here; we hunted for stones and chunks to 
block up our buckets or troughs, made long 
“ spiles” to reach to them, saw the wind blow 
the sap out, and leaves and dirt in, or tip the 
bucket over ; bent our backs to lift the sap and 
empty it; and boiled away hundreds of barrels 
of rain and snow-water colored with dirt and 
insects; and at last concluded to hang the 
bucket ou the spout and cover it tight. We 
saw the wooden buckets and spouts sour the 
sap for years, and then learned to use metal 
for both. 
For years we set our store troughs on a level 
with our arch; rolled the barrels of sap up long 
skids to empty, and dipped the sap by hand 
into the kettles or pans, and from one to the 
other; and then built on a slope, and let the 
sap ?*un doum hill from the gathering cask into 
vats and boilers, with never a pound to be 
lifted (See Fig. 5.) ; and wondered we hadn't 
thought of that before. 
We may proceed ut once to a description of 
apparatus and methods now used by the best 
sugar makers of Vermont, New York ami 
Ohio. And we shall try to make our descrip¬ 
tions aud directions so clear by the aid of 
engravings that any one may equip and run a 
“bush" by following them. When opinions 
differ on details. I simply give my own, based 
on the careful observation, travel, correspon¬ 
dence, reading, and actual working experi¬ 
ence of mauy years. Some of the appliances 
are patented. 1 give my opinions of such 
exactly and clearly. 1 
no pecuniary iuterest 
in their introduction. IvV^v v/lVj tl 
^ The Bap Bucket* \ ^ 
tin, cylindrical in lorm ^ ^ 
(not flariug) and are of ( 
three sizes, so graded 
other and form a set /jfyBjjj^ 
which is as convenient M 
as a single bucket of 
depth of each is nine 
inches. The cireum- _^re¬ 
ferences are 34,82} and 
The three buckets re- 1 ^ j| ||| I Jll || 
each bucket take two 
sheets, and a piece be- 
7} inches 
made from the sev¬ 
enth sheet of 10 x 14- 
Fig. 3.—OLD-FASHIONED SAP-BOILING. 
firmer against the tree. There is also much less 
waste of tin in making them, than in making 
conical ones. They should be soldered at every 
seam, Inside and out, and never painted inside, 
as that makes them rougher and more liable to 
sour. After a few years a coat of paint outside 
will help preserve them. Sap will not rust the 
inside, aud the buckets will last 30 years or 
more. I still have some my father boyght 37 
and hang the bucket against the 6ide of the 
tree (See Fig. 11). Thus hung the bucket 
can be covered tight. The best place for this 
hole is the middle (horizontally) of the piece 
(See Fig. 4), as the seams strengthen that part 
more, and keep it from bending when it hangs 
full. These buckets are not patented. Any 
tinner can make patterns from the above de¬ 
scription and cuts, and manufacture them. 
Figure 5. 
