edge of the water.

The gray pine is sometimes used for making the skeleton of a canoe or
other boats, and the white pine for the skin or covering of the skeleton
boat; but for you the pine will probably be most useful in furnishing
pine-knots, and its soft wood for kindling your outdoor fire.

The trees mentioned abound in our northern forests. The birch in its
different varieties is there also, but rarely ventures into the densest
woods, preferring to remain near and on its outskirts. However, none of
these trees confine themselves strictly to one locality.

Oaks, hickory, chestnut, maples, and sycamore are among the useful woods
for campers.

Learn the quality and nature of the different trees. Each variety is
distinct from the others: some woods are easy to split, such as spruce,
chestnut, balsam-fir, etc.; some very strong, as locust, oak, hickory,
sugar-maple, etc.; then there are the hard and soft woods mentioned in
fire-making.

When you once understand the characteristics of the different woods, and
their special qualifications, becoming familiar with only two or three
varieties at a time, the trees will be able to help you according to
their special powers. You would not go to a musician to have a portrait
painted, for while the musician might give you wonderful music he would
be helpless as far as painting a picture was concerned, and so it is
with trees. They cannot all give the same thing; if you want soft wood,
it is wasting your time to go to hardwood trees; they cannot give you
what they do not possess. Know the possibilities of trees and they will
not fail you.

=How to Chop Wood=

Trailing and camping both mean wood-chopping to some extent for
shelters, fires, etc., and the girl of to-day should understand, as did
the girls of our pioneer families, how to handle properly a hatchet, or
in this case we will make it a belt axe. There is a small hatchet
modelled after the Daniel Boone tomahawk, generally known as the "camp
axe." It is thicker, narrower, and has a sharper edge than an ordinary
hatchet. It comes of a size to wear on the belt and must be securely
protected by a well-fitted strong leather sheath; otherwise it will
endanger not only the life of the girl who carries it, but also the
lives of her companions. With the camp axe (hatchet) you can cut down
small trees, chop fire-wood, blaze trees, drive down pegs or stakes, and
chop kindling-wood. Every time you want to use the hatchet tak