intense, and the cellars, (the sole store-houses and receptacles of the
chief comforts) without their deep covering of snow, become penetrated
by the frost, and their contents much injured, if not totally
destroyed--this is a calamity that to be known must be experienced--the
potatoes stored here are the chief produce of the farm, at least the
part that is most available for selling, for hay should never go off the
land, and grain is as yet so little raised that 'tis but the old farmers
can do what is called "_bread themselves:_" thus the innovation of the
cellars by the _frost fiend_ is a sad and serious occurrence--of course
a deep bank of earth is thrown up round the house, beneath which, and
generally its whole length and breadth, is the cellar; but the snow over
this is an additional and even necessary defence, and its want is much
felt in many other ways--in quantity, however, it generally makes up for
its temporary absence by being five and six feet deep in April. About
this season the warm sun begins to beam out, and causes the sap to flow
in the slumbering trees--this is the season for sugar-making, which,
although an excellent thing if it can be managed, is not much attended
to, especially in new settlements, and those are generally the best off
for a "_sugar-bush_;" but it occurs at that season when the last of the
winter work must be done--the snow begins to melt on the roads, and the
"saw whet," a small bird of the owl species, makes its appearance, and
tells us, as the natives say, that "_the heart of the winter is
broken_." All that can be done now must be done to lessen the toils of
that season now approaching, from which the settler must not shrink if
he hope to prosper. Sugar-making, then, unless the farmer is strong
handed, is not profitable. A visit to a sugar-camp is an interesting
sight to a stranger--it may, perhaps, be two or three miles through the
woods to where a sufficient number of maple trees may be found close
enough together to render it eligible for sugar-making. All the
different kinds of maple yield a sweet sap, but the "rock maple" is the
species particularly used for sugar, and perhaps a thousand of these
trees near together constitute what is called a _sugar-bush_. Here,
then, a rude hut, but withal picturesque in its appearance, is
erected--it is formed of logs, and covered with broad sheets of birch
bark. For the universal use of this bark I think the Indians must have
given the exa