THE SUGARING-OFF
man is great who is not good. But come now and give me my lesson."
Ranald stepped out into the bush, and from a tree near by he lifted a trough of sap and emptied it into the big kettle.
"That's the first thing you do with the sap," he said.
"How? Carry every trough to the kettle?"
"Oh, I see," laughed Ranald. "You must have every step."
"Yes, indeed," she replied, with determination.
"Well, here it is."
He seized a bucket, went to another tree, emptied the sap from the trough into the bucket, and thence into the barrel, and from the barrel into the big kettle.
"Then from the big kettle into the little one," he said, catching up a big dipper tied to a long pole, and transferring the boiling sap as he spoke from one kettle to another.
"But how can you tell when it is ready?" asked Mrs. Murray.
"Only by tasting. When it is very sweet it must go into the little kettle."
"And then?"
Her eager determination to know all the details delighted him beyond measure.
"Then you must be very careful indeed, or you will lose all your day's work, and your sugar besides, for it is very easy to burn."
"But how can you tell when it is ready?"
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