20th.  When the wind blows high, and the fine snow drifts, as it does about the vernal equinox, in these latitudes, the Indians smilingly say, “Ah! now Pup-puk-e-wiss is gathering his harvest,” or words to this effect.  There is a mythological tale connected with it, which I have sketched.

21st.  I have amused myself in reading a rare old volume, just presented to me, entitled “A Review of the Works of the Royal Society of London, &c., by John Hill, M.D., London, 1751.”  It evinces an acute mind, ready wit, and a general acquaintance with the subjects of natural history, antiquities, and philosophical research, adverted to.  It is a racy work, which all modern naturalists, and modern discoverers of secrets and inventions ought to read.  I should think it must have made some of the contributors to the “Transactions” of the Royal Society wince in its day.

22d.  Knowledge of foreign nations has increased most wonderfully in our day, and is one of the best tests of civilization.  Josaphat Barbaro traveled into the East in 1436.  He says of the Georgians, “They have the most horrid manners, and the worst customs of any people I ever met with.”  Surely this is vague enough for even the clerk who kept the log-book of Henry Hudson.  Such items as the following were deemed “food” for books of travels in those days:  “The people of Cathay, in China, believe that they are the only people in the world who have two eyes.  To the Latins they allow one, and all the rest of the world none at all.”

Marco Polo gives an account of a substance called “Andanicum,” which he states to be an ore of steel.  In those days, when everything relating to metallurgy and medicine was considered a secret, the populace did not probably know that steel was an artificial production.  Or the mineral may have been sparry iron ore, which is readily converted into steel.

26th.  It is now the season of making sugar from the rock maple by the Indians and Canadians in this quarter.  And it seems to be a business in which almost every one is more or less interested.  Winter has shown some signs of relaxing its iron grasp, although the quantity of snow upon the ground is still very great, and the streams appear to be as fast locked in the embraces of frost as if it were the slumber of ages.  Sleighs and dog trains have been departing for the maple forests, in our neighborhood, since about the 10th instant, until but few, comparatively, of the resident inhabitants are left.  Many buildings are entirely deserted and closed, and all are more or less thinned of their inhabitants.  It is also the general season of sugar-making with the Indians.