"Bully, ain't it?" said Dick, cleaning off the spoon. "Best we ever made--fine and white; it'll fetch top price. But say, we could make it still better if we only had a new up-to-date outfit. We've got to get it somehow, I guess, even if we don't buy new coats this year; guess our old ones will go another year; we ain't dudes." Sure enough, that day, to the delight of the boys, another thaw came and the sap ran as it never had done before and kept them jumping well to save it all. "One of us will have to stay awake and tend fires and watch to-night. We can't finish up anyhow, and we can't afford to waste all this sap. I'll boil all night," said Dick, tucking the embers in around the great kettle. "You won't tend alone. If you stay up all night I shall too," said Joe stoutly. "Guess we're partners on this sugar making, ain't we?" "Of course. Tell you what we will do: I'll tend till midnight, while you sleep, then you can work the rest of the night while I sleep," suggested Dick. To which his brother agreed willingly. The boys ate their supper, boiling their eggs in sap, and finishing up with brown bread spread thickly with soft, new maple sugar. And oh, how fine it tasted to the two tired boys. Soon Joe was fast asleep in the shack upon his fragrant bed of balsam boughs, rolled up in an old patchwork quilt his mother had made him take, for it always grows bitterly cold in the mountains before morning. Dick grinned to himself, as he worked alone and heard Joe's tired snores coming from the shack, and he made up his mind to let him sleep after midnight and get well rested. He kept very busy himself tending the bubbling syrup in both kettles and bringing firewood. It was somewhat lonely off up there in the mountain, now there was no one to talk to, thought Joe to himself. The wind sighed and whined in the tops of the spruces. Occasionally he heard a mysterious crack upon the snow crusts, off in the woods, where some hoof or paw broke through. Finally, an old owl began its lonely hoot above the shack somewhere, and once he heard a long, whimpering yell, far across the valley. He knew what that meant; a lynx was abroad, venturing down into the clearings after a sheep perhaps. Joe looked back into the shack rather longingly after the lynx yelled; he was almost tempted to awaken Dick, but decided, unselfishly, not to. At last, long after midnight, Joe himself began to feel extremely worn out and sleepy. A great stillness had settled over everything; even the wind seemed to soothe him to drowsiness, while the sap bubbled and blubbered softly and monotonously in the iron kettles. In spite of all he could do, Joe's tired eyes closed together, and, untended, the fires under the black kettles burned lower and lower.