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They took off the paper wrappings, and each had a little, hard, brown cake, with beautifully crinkled edges

“Bite it,” said Pa, and his blue eyes twinkled

Each bit off one little crinkle, and it eet It crumbled in their mouths It was better even than their Christmas candy

“Maple sugar,” said Pa

Supper was ready, and Laura and Mary laid the little ar cakes beside their plates, while they ate the maple syrup on their bread

After supper, Pa took them on his knees as he sat before the fire, and told thear snow

“All winter,” Pa said, “Grandpa has been hs He ive a bad taste to the maple syrup

“Toas ers Near one end, Grandpa cut the stick half through, and split one half off This left him a flat stick, with a square piece at one end Then with a bit he bored a hole lengthwise through the square part, and with his knife he whittled the wood till it was only a thin shell around the round hole The flat part of the stick he hollowed out with his knife till it was a little trough

“He made dozens of them, and he made ten neooden buckets He had thean to move in the trees

“Then he went into the maple woods and with the bit he bored a hole in each h into the hole, and he set a cedar bucket on the ground under the flat end

“The sap, you know, is the blood of a tree It co, and it goes to the very tip of each branch and twig, to row

“Well, when the maple sap came to the hole in the tree, it ran out of the tree, down the little trough and into the bucket”

“Oh, didn’t it hurt the poor tree?” Laura asked

“No er and it bleeds,” said Pa

“Every day Grandpa puts on his boots and his waroes out into the snooods and gathers the sap With a barrel on a sled, he drives from tree to tree and empties the sap fro iron kettle, that hangs by a chain from a cross-timber between two trees