Vermont phÅ“nix. [volume] (Brattleboro, Vt.) 1834-1955, 1877-03-09
BeDermont 9Banif.
BRATTLEBoRo
FRIDAY EVENING, MARCH 0, 1877.



er Cheery's maple forest, awoke the trees
from their long, long sleep, and they all
began TO shake hands and nod toward each
other, whispering: "Good J Goodi Here
comes the SPRING."
Soon the warm air made them feel thirs-
ty and faint the tiny twigs complained 10
the branches the branches told the trunks,
and the trunks carried the news down TO
the roots. Maple trees keep all their pro-
visions in an underground cellar; so the
roots finding that, sure enough, the ground
was no longer frozen and hard, began TO
feel about, and sent out little rootlets that
gathered up the good things,-just the kinds
they knew maple twigs loved best. Doesn'tit
seem funny that they can tell The naples
take one kind of food, the pines another,
the birches another, and for each the root
lets pick out just the right kind from the
same ground. As fast as the rootlets gath
cred the food, they sent 1t up TO the branch
"a very delicate sweet drink and still
they sent more and more, the little twigs
always taking the freshest, and sending
back what was left over. The branches
felt very much revived as they were fed,
grew very social, and began to tell of the
pretty red dresses they would put on be-
fore long; red for the cool spring days, and
afterward green for hot summer. They
were merry planning their new ward
robes, l assure you; you could have heard
it you had had the right kind OF ears.
Farmer CHEEKY came in from his barn
chores.
az say, wife, it's growing warm
Shouldn't wonder if the sap would run
such weather as this guess 1 must tap one
tree and see."
So Farmer CHEEKY took his auGer and
went out into the maple orchard. 1t didn't
take him long TO make little hole in one
of the tree trunks, and put in little spout;
nor was it many minutes before drop by
drop came the sap.
"Ah that's finer said Farmer CHEEKY,
aud he went home in haste. The next we
saw of him, he was driving out into the or
chard with load of one hundred and fifty
clean, bright, tin-buckets and one hum
bred and fifly fresh little troughs. Then, in
each one of his hundred and fifty maple
trees he bored a hole and put trough in,
and bucket beneath 10 catch the sap as it
came dropping out.
"Didn't it starve the poor little branches
waiting for their food2"
Oh, no! There was enough for them left,
all they needed 10 keep them very fresh
and make them grow. So many, many
pailfuls ran up and down every day, that
the one Farmer CHEEKY took would hardly
be missed.
Every morning and night for two or
three weeks, the good farmer might be
seen with his great tank, clean as clean
could be, driving around 10 collect the sap
that had run out. He knew that one rea-
son why maple sugar is sometimes dark
colored is because the pals and tanks that
hold the sap are not washed thoroughly SO
he took great pains with his. He knew,
too, that if any water gets in, the sap must
be bo lied longer 10 mako sugar of it, and
the longer it is boiled the darker it grows;
so ifhe saw a storm coming, he collected all
the sap, and turned the buckets upside
down till the rain was over.
Farmer CHEEKY had great iron pan,
which would hold lob, don't dare tell
you how many pailfuls,-a great, great
many; and this very large pan rested on
some stone posts about two feet from the
ground. UuGer this he built fire, and in
to ii he poured his sap, stirring it while it
boiled almost all day long. When he drew
it off, such beautiful clear syrup don. be-
lieve you ever saw. This he did two or
three times each week for nearly month !;
after that, the sap was not as good for peo-
pie to use, though just what the little twigs
needed as they grew older.
Some of his syrup the farmer put up in
cans 10 send TO the cities; some of it he
boiled more and more, so that it would be
sugar when cooled. Then he poured it in
to pretty scalloped tins, TO harden into the
round cakes you like so much and some
of it his little grandchildren waxed on
snow.
You don't know how that is?
Well, May packed painful of snow, just
as hard as she could crowd it in then she
smoothed off the top as even as a marble
table, and she and Sally carried it 10 Grand =
pa CHEEKY, who dropped upon their snow a
spoonful of the hot syrup here and there.
The little thin, waxy sheets of suddenly
cooled syrup, picked up with fork and
eaten as soon as cool, made an excellent
luncheon and the children tugged their
pan of snow around to give every one a
taste, declaring that "sugar-season" was
the very best time in the year.-Ruth Ken.
yon, 81. Nicholas for Mach.
"
Sailing toward the South Pole.