ASPR Journal, V14 - Iapsop.com

Recent Experiments Continued. 191
mixed up with a reference to " hogsheads of sap " referring to
the sugar making and apparently wholly irrelevant to the soap
making and perfectly illustrating the earlier message on the
cause of interfusion and confusion in the messages. The connection
however, is quite natural. The kettle in which the soap
was made was one used in sugar time, as we called it, to boil
the maple sap into syrup, and the place of making the soap was
near the furnace for making maple syrup and sugar. Hence the
association for both reasons was perfectly natural and in my own
memory it is impossible to think of one of the scenes without
having the other in my mind.
The next part of the message, however, is not directly associated
with soap making or sugar making. It is merely an
associate of the reference to ashes and by implication to the lye
made of them. We hulled yellow com and boiled it in lye to
remove the skin and it made it a " light " color. This we called
hominy and used large quantities of it in winter for food.
'Maple syrup was often used with it, but not generally. I suspect
the reference to " candy " corrected and to our getting our
" sweet in another fonn ", owing to the reference in this connection,
is to " taffy " which we made of maple syrup. We
seldom had can.dy bought for us, but often had maple taffy,
especially at the time of year in which the maple syrup and the
soap were ma.de.
The next incident would seem to have no connection with
this and ordinarily has none. But the season in which the soap
and maple syrup were made was always very muddy and our
boots gave trouble to housekeepers. Hence this circumstance
may have recalled the following.
I want to say something about a little stairs, narrow and steep,
that led up to a place where many things were kept to use on the
feet in the winter. Do you know what I mean?
(Not certain yet.)
I am after a wooden bootjack, thing to pull off wet long boots,
a homemade board with a V in it.
In the front hall was a narrow and steep stairway to the
second story of the house. Under that stairway was a closet
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