THE CANOE BIRCH.
Betula papyrifera, Marsh.
The canoe birch or paper birch is the noblest member of the family. (See cover of book.) Ernest Thompson Seton calls it "The White Queen of the Woods—the source of food, drink, transport, and lodging to those who dwell in the forest—the most bountiful provider of all the trees." Then he enumerates the sweet syrup yielded by its sap; the meal made by drying and grinding the inner bark; the buds and catkins upon which the partridge feeds; and the outer bark, which is its best gift to primitive man.
"The broad sheets of this vegetable rawhide, ripped off when the weather is warm, and especially when the sap is moving, are tough, light, strong, pliant, absolutely water proof, almost imperishable in the weather; free from in sects, assailable only by fire. It roofs the settler's shack and the forest Indian's wigwam. It supplies cups, pails,
pots, pans, spoons, boxes; under its protecting power the matches are safe and dry; split very thin, as is easily done, it is the writing paper of the woods, flat, light, smooth, waterproof, tinted, and scented; but the crowning glory of the birch is this—it furnishes the indispensable substance for the bark canoe, whose making is the highest industrial exploit of the Indian life." From the Atlantic to the Pacific, and from our northern tier of states to the arctic seas, woodsmen, red and white, have found this white-barked tree ready to their hand, their sure defense against death by cold and by starvation. The weather is never so wet but that shreds of birch bark burn merrily to start a campfire, and the timber of the trunk burns readily green or dry.