CHAPTER V.
INDIAN BASKETS—THREAD PLANTS—MAPLE SUGAR TREE—INDIAN ORNAMENTAL WORKS— RACOONS
It was some time before Lady Mary's nurse could tell her any more stories. She received a letter from her sister-in-law, informing her that her brother was dangerously ill, confined to what was feared would prove his deathbed, and that he earnestly desired to see her before he died. The Governor's lady, who was very kind and good to all her household, readily consented to let Mrs. Frazer go to her sick relation.
Lady Mary parted from her dear nurse, whom she loved very tenderly, with much regret. Mrs. Frazer told her that it might be a fortnight before she could return, as her brother lived on the shores of one of the small lakes, near the head waters of the Otonabee river, a great way off; but she promised to return as soon as she could, and to console her young mistress for her absence, said she would bring her some Indian toys from the backwoods.
The month of March passed away pleasantly, for Lady Mary enjoyed many delightful sleigh-drives with her papa and mamma, who took every opportunity to instruct and amuse her. On entering her nursery one day, after enjoying a long drive in the country, great was her joy to find her good nurse sitting quietly at work by the stove. She was dressed in deep mourning, and looked much thinner and paler than when she had last seen her.
The kind little girl knew, when she saw her nurse's black dress, that her brother must be dead; and with the thoughtfulness of a true lady, remained very quiet, and did not annoy her with questions about trifling matters; she spoke low and gently to her, and tried to comfort her when she saw large tears falling on the work which she held in her hand, kindly said, "Mrs, Frazer, you had better go and lie down and rest yourself, for you must be tired after your long long journey."
The next day Mrs. Frazer seemed to be much better; and she showed Lady Mary an Indian basket, made of birch-bark, very richly wrought with coloured porcupine-quills, and which had two lids.
Lady Mary admired the splendid colours, and strange patterns on the basket.
"It is for you, my dear," said her nurse, "open it, and see what is in it." Lady Mary lifted one of the lids, and took out another small basket, of a different shape and pattern. It had a top, which was sewn down with coarse-looking thread, which her nurse told her was nothing but the sinews of the deer, dried and beaten fine, and drawn out like thread. Then, taking an end of it in her hand, she made Lady Mary observe that these coarse threads could be separated into a great number of finer ones, sufficiently delicate to pass through the eye of a fine needle, or to string tiny beads.
"The Indians, my lady, sew with the sinews of the wild animals they kill. These sinews are much stronger and tougher than thread, and therefore are well adapted to sew together such things as moccasins, leggings, and garments made of the skins of wild animals. The finer threads are used for sewing the beads and quill ornaments on moccasins, sheaths, and pouches, besides other things that I cannot now think of.
"They sew some things with the roots of the tamarack, of larch; such as coarse birch-baskets, bark canoes, and the covering of their wigwams. They call this 'wah-tap,' [Footnote: Asclepia paviflora.] (wood-thread,) and they prepare it by pulling off the outer rind and steeping it in water. It is the larger fibres which have the appearance of small cordage when coiled up and fit for use. This 'wah-tap' is very valuable to these poor Indians. There is also another plant, called Indian hemp, which is a small shrubby kind of milk-weed, that grows on gravelly islands. It bears white flowers, and the branches are long and slender; under the bark there is a fine silky thread covering the wood; this is tough, and can be twisted and spun into cloth. It is very white and fine, and does not easily break. There are other plants of the same family, with pods full of fine shining silk; but these are too brittle to spin into thread. This last kind, Lady Mary, which is called Milk-weed flytrap, I will show you in summer." [Footnote: Asclepia Syriaca.]
But while Mrs. Frazer was talking about these plants, the little lady was examining the contents of the small birch-box. "If you please, nurse, will you tell me what these dark shining seeds are?"
"These seeds, my dear, are Indian rice; an old squaw, Mrs. Peter Noggan, gave me this as a present for 'Governor's daughter,'" and Mrs. Frazer imitated the soft, whining tone of the Indian, which made Lady Mary laugh.
"The box is called a 'mowkowk.' There is another just like it, only there is a white bird,—a snow-bird, I suppose it is intended for—worked on the lid." The lid of this box was fastened down with a narrow slip of deer-skin; Lady Mary cut the fastening, and raised the lid,—"Nurse, it is only yellow sand; how droll, to send me a box of sand!"
"It is not sand; taste it, Lady Mary."
"It is sweet—it is sugar! Ah! now I know what it is that this kind old squaw has sent me; it is maple-sugar; and is very nice. I will go and show it to mamma."
"Wait a little, Lady Mary, let us see what there is in the basket besides the rice and the maple-sugar."
"What a lovely thing this is! dear nurse, what can it be?"
"It is a sheath for your scissors, my dear; it is made of doe-skin, embroidered with white beads, and coloured quills split fine, and sewn with deer-sinew thread. Look at these curious bracelets."
Lady Mary examined the bracelets, and said she thought they were wrought with beads; but Mrs. Frazer told her that what she took for beads were porcupine quills, cut out very finely, and strung in a pattern. They were not only neatly but tastefully made; the pattern, though a Grecian scroll, having been carefully imitated by some Indian squaw.
"This embroidered knife-sheath is large enough for a hunting-knife," said
Lady Mary, "a 'couteau de chasse,'—is it not?"
"This sheath was worked by the wife of Isaac Iron, an educated chief of the Mud Lake Indians; she gave it to me because I had been kind to her in sickness."
"I will give it to my dear papa," said Lady Mary, "for I never go out hunting, and do not wish to carry a large knife by my side;" and she laid the sheath away, after having admired its gay colours, and particularly the figure of a little animal worked in black and white quills, which was intended to represent a racoon.
"This is a present for your doll; it is a doll's mat, woven by a little girl, aged seven years, Rachel Muskrat; and here is a little canoe of red cedar, made by a little Indian boy."
"What a darling little boat, and there is a fish carved on the paddles." This device greatly pleased Lady Mary, who said she would send Rachel a wax doll, and little Moses a knife, or some other useful article, when Mrs. Frazer went again to the Lakes; but when her nurse took out of the other end of the basket a birch-bark cradle, made for her doll, worked very richly, she clapped her hands for joy, saying, "Ah, nurse, you should not have brought me so many pretty things at once, for I am too happy!"
The remaining contents of the basket consisted of seeds and berries, and a small cake of maple-sugar, which Mrs. Frazer had made for the young lady. This was very different in appearance from the Indian sugar; it was bright and sparkling, like sugar-candy, and tasted sweeter. The other sugar was dry, and slightly bitter: Mrs. Frazer told Lady Mary that this peculiar taste was caused by the birch-bark vessels, which the Indians used for catching the sap as it flowed from the maple-trees.
"I wonder who taught the Indians how to make maple-sugar?" asked the child.
"I do not know;" replied the nurse. "I have heard that they knew how to make this sugar when the discoverers of the country found them. [Footnote: However this may be, the French settlers claim the merit of converting the sap into sugar.] It may be that they found it out by accident. The sugar-maple when wounded in March, and April, yields a great deal of sweet liquor. Some Indians may have supplied themselves with this juice, when pressed for want of water; for it flows so freely in warm days in spring, that several pints can be obtained from one tree in the course of the day. By boiling this juice, it becomes very sweet; and at last, when all the thin watery part has gone off in steam, it becomes thick, like honey; by boiling it still-longer, it turns to sugar, when cold. So you see, my dear, that the Indians may have found it out by boiling some sap, instead of water, and letting it remain on the fire till it grew thick."
"Are there many kinds of maple-trees, that sugar can be made from, nurse?" asked the little girl.
"Yes, [Footnote: All the maple tribe are of a saccharine nature. Sugar has been made in England from the sap of the sycamore.] my lady; but I believe the sugar-maple yields the best sap for the purpose; that of the birch-tree, I have heard, can be made into sugar; but it would require a larger quantity; weak wine, or vinegar, is made by the settlers of birch-sap, which is very pleasant tasted. The people who live in the backwoods, and make maple-sugar, always make a keg of vinegar at the sugaring off."
"That must be very useful; but if the sap is sweet, how can it be made into such sour stuff as vinegar?"
Then nurse tried to make Lady Mary understand that the heat of the sun, or of a warm room, would make the liquor ferment, unless it had been boiled a long time, so as to become very sweet, and somewhat thick. The first fermentation, she told her, would give only a winy taste; but if it continued to ferment a great deal, it turned sour, and became vinegar.
"How very useful the maple-tree is, nurse! I wish there were maples in the garden, and I would make sugar, molasses, wine, and vinegar; and what else would I do with my maple-tree?"
Mrs. Frazer laughed, and said,—"The wood makes excellent fuel; but is also used in making bedsteads, chests of drawers, and many other things. There is a very pretty wood for furniture, called 'bird's-eye maple;' the drawers in my bedroom that you think so pretty are made of it; but it is a disease in the tree that causes it to have these little marks all through the wood. In autumn, this tree improves the forest landscape, for the bright scarlet leaves of the maple give a beautiful look to the woods in the fall. The soft maple, another species, is very bright when the leaves are changing, but it gives no sugar."
"Then I will not let it grow in my garden, nurse!"
"It is good for other purposes, my dear. The settlers use the bark for dyeing wool; and a jet black ink can be made from it, by boiling down the bark with a bit of copperas, in an iron vessel; so you see it is useful. The bright red flowers of this tree look very pretty in the spring; it grows best by the water-side, and some call it 'the swamp maple.'"
This was all Mrs. Frazer could tell Lady Mary about the maple-trees. Many little girls, as young as the Governor's daughter, would have thought it very dull to listen to what her nurse had to say about plants and trees; but Lady Mary would put aside her dolls and toys, to stand beside her to ask questions, and listen to her answers; the more she heard, the more she desired to hear, about these things. "The hearing ear, and the seeing eye, are two things that are never satisfied," saith the wise king Solomon.
Lady Mary was delighted with the contents of her Indian basket, and spent the rest of her play-hours in looking at the various articles it contained, and asking her nurse questions about the materials of which they were made. Some of the bark boxes were lined with paper, but the doll's cradle was not, and Lady Mary perceived that the inside of it was very rough, caused by the hard ends of the quills with which it was ornamented. At first, she could not think how the squaws worked with the quills, as they could not possibly thread them through the eye of a needle; but her nurse told her that when they want to work any pattern in birch-bark, they trace it with some sharp-pointed instrument, such as a nail, or bodkin, or even a sharp thorn; with which they pierce holes close together round the edge of the leaf, or blade, or bird they have drawn out on the birch-bark; into these holes they insert one end of the quill, the other end is then drawn through the opposite hole, pulled tight, bent a little, and cut off on the inside. This any one of my young readers may see, if they examine the Indian baskets or toys, made of birch-bark. "I have seen the squaws in their wigwams at work on these things, sitting cross-legged on their mats,—some had the quills in a little bark dish on their laps, while others held them in their mouths—not a very safe nor delicate way; but Indians are not very nice in some of their habits," said Mrs. Frazer.
"Nurse, if you please, will you tell me what this little animal is designed to represent," said Lady Mary, pointing to the figure of the racoon worked in quills on the sheath of the hunting-knife.
"It is intended for a racoon, my lady," replied her nurse.
"Is the racoon a pretty creature like my squirrel?"
"It is much larger than your squirrel; its fur is not nearly so soft or so fine; the colour being black and grey, or dun; the tail barred across, and bushy,—you have seen many sleigh-robes made of racoon-skins, with the tails looking like tassels at the back of the sleighs."
"Oh, yes, and a funny cunning-looking face peeping out too!"
"The face of this little animal is sharp, and the eyes black and keen, like a fox; the feet bare, like the soles of our feet, only black and leathery; their claws are very sharp; they can climb trees very fast. During the winter the racoons sleep in hollow trees, and cling together for the sake of keeping each other warm. The choppers find as many as seven or eight in one nest, fast asleep. Most probably the young family remain with the old ones until spring, when, they separate. The racoon in its habits is said to resemble the bear; like the bear, it lives chiefly on vegetables, especially Indian corn, but I do not think that it lays by any store for winter. They sometimes awake if there come a few warm days, but soon retire again to their warm cosy nests."
"Racoons will eat eggs; and fowls are often taken by them,—perhaps this is in the winter, when they wake up and are pressed by hunger."
Her nurse said that one of her friends had a racoon which he kept in a wooden cage, but he was obliged to have a chain and collar to keep him from getting away, as he used to gnaw the bars asunder; and had slily stolen away and killed some ducks, and was almost as mischievous as a fox, but was very lively and amusing in his way.
Lady Mary now left her good nurse, and took her basket, with all its Indian treasures, to show to her mamma,—with whom we leave her for the present.