When, one day, we were overtaken by a shower in traveling through
the woods, our guide quickly stripped large sheets of the bark from a
near tree, and we had each a perfect umbrella as by magic. When the
rain was over, and we moved on, I wrapped mine about me like a large
leather apron, and it shielded my clothes from the wet bushes. When we
came to a spring, Uncle Nathan would have a birch-bark cup ready before
any of us could get a tin one out of his knapsack, and I think water
never tasted so sweet as from one of these bark cups. It is exactly
the thing. It just fits the mouth and it seems to give new virtues to
the water. It makes me thirsty now when I think of it. In our camp at
Moxie we made a large birch-bark box to keep the butter in; and the
butter in this box, covered with some leafy boughs, I think improved in
flavor day by day. Maine butter needs something to mollify and sweeten
it a little, and I think birch bark will do it. In camp Uncle Nathan
often drank his tea and coffee from a bark cup; the china closet in the
birch-tree was always handy, and our vulgar tin ware was generally a
good deal mixed, and the kitchen-maid not at all particular about
dish-washing.
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