ighbor drove by and pulled up to comment benevolently on my
work.

"Will it run to-night?" I asked him.

"No--no--'t won't run to-night. Too cold. 'T won't run any to-night. You can
sleep all right."

This was pleasant to hear. There was a moon, to be sure, but it was
growing colder, and at the idea of crawling along that road in the middle
of the night even my enthusiasm shivered a little.

So I made my rounds at nine, in the white moonlight, and went to sleep.

I was awakened the next morning to a consciousness of flooding sunshine
and Hiram's voice outside my window.

"Got anything I can empty sap into? I've got everything all filled up."

"Sap! Why, it isn't running yet, is it?"

"Pails were flowin' over when I came out."

"Flowing over! They said the sap wouldn't run last night."

"I guest there don't nobody know when sap'll run and when it won't," said
Hiram peacefully, as he tramped off to the barn.

In a few minutes I was outdoors. Sure enough, Hiram had everything
full--old boilers, feed-pails, water-pails. But we found some three-gallon
milk-cans and used them. A farm is like a city. There are always things
enough in it for all purposes. It is only a question of using its
resources.

Then, in the clear April sunshine, I went out and surveyed the row of
maples. How they did drip! Some of them almost ran. I felt as if I had
turned on the faucets of the universe and didn't know how to turn them off
again.

However, there was my new pan. I set it over my oven walls and began to
pour in sap. Hiram helped me. He seemed to think he needed his feed-pails.
We poured in sap and we poured in sap. Never did I see anything hold so
much as that pan. Even Hiram was stirred out of his usual calm to remark,
"It beats all, how much that holds." Of course Jonathan would have had its
capacity all calculated the day before, but my methods are empirical, and
so I was surprised as well as pleased when all my receptacles emptied
themselves into its shallow breadths and still there was a good inch to
allow for boiling up. Yes, Providence--my exclusive little fool's
Providence--was with me. The pan, and the oven, were a success, and when
Jonathan came that night I led him out with unconcealed pride and showed
him the pan--now a heaving, frothing mass of sap-about-to-be-syrup, sending
clouds of white steam down the wind. As he looked at the oven walls, I
fancied his fingers ached to get at them, but he offered no criticis