One of the most anxious periods in the boiling I found to be when the liquor began first to assume a yellowish frothy appearance, and cast up so great a volume of steam from its surface as to obscure the contents of the pot; as it may then rise over almost unperceived by the most vigilant eye.  As the liquor thickens into molasses, it becomes a fine yellow, and seems nothing but thick froth.  When it is getting pretty well boiled down, the drops begin to fall clear and ropy from the ladle; and if you see little bright grainy-looking bubbles in it, drop some on a cold plate, and continue to stir or rub it till it is quite cold:  if it is ready to granulate, you will find it gritty, and turn whitish or pale straw colour; and stiff.  The sugar may then safely be poured off into a tin dish, pail, basin, or any other utensil.  I tried two different methods after taking the sugar from the fire, but could find little difference in the look of the sugar, except that in one the quantity was broken up more completely; in the other the sugar remained in large lumps, but equally pure and sparkling.  In the first I kept stirring the sugar till it began to cool and form a whitish thick substance, and the grains were well crystallised; in the other process, —­which I think preferable, as being the least troublesome,—­I waited till the mass was hardened into sugar, and then, piercing the crust in many places, I turned the mass into a cullender, and placed the cullender over a vessel to receive the molasses that drained from the sugar.  In the course of the day or two, I frequently stirred the sugar, which thus became perfectly free from moisture, and had acquired a fine sparkling grain, tasting exactly like sugar-candy, free from any taste of the maple-sap, and fit for any purpose.

I observed that in general maple-sugar, as it is commonly made, is hard and compact, showing little grain, and weighing very heavy in proportion to its bulk.  Exactly the reverse is the case with that I made, it being extremely light for its bulk, all the heavy molasses having been separated, instead of dried into the sugar.  Had the present season been at all a favourable one, which it was not, we should have made a good quantity of excellent sugar.

VINEGAR.

By boiling down five gallons of sap to one, and when just a little above the heat of new milk, putting in a cupful of barm (hop-rising will do if it be good), and letting the vessel remain in your kitchen chimney-corner during the summer, and perhaps longer, you will obtain a fine, cheap, pleasant, and strong vinegar, fit for any purpose.  This plan I have pursued successfully two years.  Care must be taken that the cask or keg be well seasoned and tight before the vinegar is put in; as the dryness of the summer heat is apt to shrink the vessel, and make it leak.  If putty well wrought, tar, or even yellow soap, be rubbed over the seams, and round the inner rim of the head of the cask, it will preserve it from opening.  The equal