CHAPTER XXTHE SUGAR CAMP
An untimely snow storm that was wholly unlooked for by the boys dismayed them by putting a stop to their practice for the time being. But the snow, though heavy, did not last long, and began to melt rapidly under the rays of the sun.
“See how the water is running down those trees,” remarked Shiner, looking out of the window one Friday morning.
“That isn’t water, boy,” said Sparrow. “That’s sap. The trees are bursting with it just now.”
“By the way, fellows,” put in Skeets, “have you ever been to a maple sugar camp when the sap was running?”
Most of them had not and Skeets went on to explain.
“It’s the best fun ever,” he said; “and now’s just the time to see it running full blast when the snow is melting and the air is warm. On a day like this the sap comes down in bucketfuls. And you can see just how they collect it, and how they boil it down until it’s a thick syrup, and the way that hot maple sugar does taste—yum yum!” and here he closed his eyes in blissful recollection.
“Sounds mighty good to me,” said Pee Wee, with whom the memory of Meena and her breakfast of buckwheat cakes and maple syrup still lingered.
“You can take out the hot sugar in big spoons and let it cool on a pan of snow,” continued Skeets, drawing out the details as he saw that his friends’ mouths were watering in anticipation, “and when you get the first taste of it you never want to stop eating.”
“I wonder if there’s a sugar camp anywhere around here,” said Pee Wee with great animation.
“I know of one that’s about three miles away,” said Sparrow. “What do you say to our making up a party and going out there to-morrow if Doc Raymond will let us go out of bounds?”
There was a general chorus of gleeful assent.
“What we ought to do,” said Skeets, “is to have a couple of fellows go out there to-day and make arrangements. We want to take up a collection and fix it up with the farmer’s wife to have hot biscuits and other things ready for us. I tell you what, fellows, hot biscuits and fresh butter and hot thick maple sugar just out of the boiler—”
“Don’t say another word,” cried Pee Wee frantically, “or I’ll never, never be able to wait till to-morrow.”
They took stock of their resources and collected several dollars between them, enough they thought to cover the expense. Bobby and Fred were appointed as a committee of two to go out to the camp that afternoon so that everything would be in readiness on the morrow.
Dr. Raymond’s permission was readily obtained, and the chums set out on their three mile walk. They had no trouble in finding the camp and the farmer’s wife, a bright, cheery person, was very ready to entertain the party and promised to have an abundant lunch provided for them.
The boys would have dearly liked to inspect the camp, but they had promised their chums that they would not do so until all could see it together, and they kept loyally to their word.
No finer day could have been selected for that particular outing than the one that dawned the next morning. The air was mild and the sun shining brightly. The only drawback was the walking, as the roads were full of mud in some places and melting slush in others, but as they were all warmly shod that made little difference.
Pee Wee groaned occasionally as he lagged along in the rear, but they had no fear of his dropping out. It would have taken a good deal more than a three-mile walk to keep Pee Wee away from that sugar camp after Skeets’s description.
“There it is,” cried Fred at last, pointing to a big grove of trees in the rear of a farmhouse.
Pee Wee sniffed the air.
“Seems to me I can smell the sugar cooking from here,” he said joyously.
They left the road now, took a short cut across the fields and soon entered the grove of maples.
It was an extensive grove, containing several hundred of the stately trees. Into each one of these that had reached their full growth a hole had been made, a spigot driven in, and a bright tin pail suspended from each spigot. Into these pails the sap was falling with a musical drip so that a tinkling murmur ran through the grove as though some one were gently touching the strings of a zither.
An old horse attached to a low sled was shambling slowly along through the woodland paths, stopping at each tree. The driver would empty the pail into one of several large cans that the sled contained, replace the pail and go on to the next.
“Seems almost a shame to tap those splendid trees,” murmured Mouser. “It’s almost like bleeding them to death.”
“Doesn’t do them a bit of harm,” explained Skeets cheerfully. “The farmers take good care not to drain out more sap than the tree can spare.”
When the sled had made its round, the boys followed it to the shed where the sap was boiled down into sugar. Here they saw an enormous caldron with a roaring fire underneath. Into this caldron the sap was poured, and here its transformation began. A delicious odor arose that made the nostrils of the boys dilate hungrily.
Every little while, the man who was supervising the boiling drew out a huge ladleful to see how thick it was getting. At a certain stage he turned to the boys with a grin.
“Each one of you take one of those pans,” he directed, pointing to a bright row of dairy tins which the housewife had made ready. “Fill them up with snow and pack the snow down hard.”
In a twinkling the boys were ready. Then, as each held up his pan, the man poured a big ladle of the hot syrup on the snow. The rich golden brown against the whiteness of the snow would have delighted the soul of an artist. But these lads were not artists, only hungry boys, and their only concern was to get the sugar cool enough to eat.
Pee Wee in fact burned his lips and tongue by starting too soon, but he soon forgot a trifle like that, and in a moment more he and the others were eating as if they had never tasted anything so good in all their lives.
“Hot biscuits coming, boys,” smiled the farmer. “Better leave some room.”
“Let them come,” mumbled Mouser with his mouth full of sugar. “None of them will go away again.”
And they made good this prophecy when a little later they were called into the farmhouse, where a table was spread, heaped high with fluffy biscuits just from the oven. On these the boys spread butter and then piled them up with the delicious syrup. There were other things on the table too, pickles and pies and cakes, but to these the boys paid slight attention. They could have those any day, but to-day maple sugar was king.
When at length they were through, they all acknowledged to having eaten more than was good for them.
“We’ll have to use a derrick to get Pee Wee on his feet,” laughed Bobby.
“And borrow the horse and sled to take him back to school,” said Sparrow.
But it was not quite so bad as that, though after they started back the other boys had to moderate their gait in order not to leave Pee Wee too far behind.
“Hurry up, Pee Wee,” admonished Skeets. “You’re slow as molasses.”
“Slow as maple syrup when it’s cooling,” amended Sparrow.
“Well, fellows, this has sure been a bully trip,” remarked Shiner, summing up the sentiments of all.
“This is the end of a perfect day,” Fred chanted gayly, lifting up his voice in song.