50 LITTLE WANDERERS. 
and a little wooden tube or trough is driven into the 
hole. A pail is hung or set beneath to catch the sap 
as it runs out. Sap runs best when the days are warm 
and the nights cold ; then there are merry times in the 
sugar camps. 
The sap is collected in large kettles and boiled to 
syrup, or until it hardens into sugar. Just before it 
is ready to turn to sugar, it makes delicious "wax." 
You pour the hot, thick syrup upon snow, and when it 
thickens into a sticky paste you eat it. It is better 
than any kind of candy — at least I think so. 
A great deal of sugar is made in the New England 
States, where the maple grows abundantly, and in the 
early days the only sugar some of the people had was 
maple sugar. 
Sometimes the sap of other trees, as birches or elms, 
is made into syrup, but none is as abundant or as good 
as the maple syrup. 
The wood of the sugar maple is hard and is valuable 
for furniture and other uses. Indeed the wood of most 
of the maples is prized for furniture making. 
The bird's eye maple is a very pretty satiny wood 
dotted over with round spots that look a little like eyes. 
It comes from certain sugar maples whose wood is full 
of little knotty places. 
The curled maple is also a pretty wood with wavy, 
shining lines made by irregular streaks in the wood. 
