646 Junior Naturalist Monthly. 



branch. Each apple came from a single flower. These flowers grew in a 



cluster. There were three other flowers in this cluster, for I could see the 



scars where they fell off. 



But why did these three fruits die? The whole branch on which 



they grew looked to be only half alive. I believe that it did not have 



vigor enough to cause the fruit to grow and ripen. If this were not the 



cause, then some insect or disease killed the young apples, for apples, as 



well as people, have disease. 



Beneath the three dead apples, is still another dead one. Notice how 



shriveled and dried it is, and how the snows and rains have beaten away 



the little leaves from its tip. The three uppermost apples grew in 1902 ; 



but this apple grew in some previous 



year. If I should show you the 



branch itself, I could make you see 



in just what year this little apple 



was born, and just what this branch 



has tried to do every year since. This 



branch has tried its best to bear 



apples, but the fruit-grower has not 



given it food enough, nor kept the 



enemies and diseases away. 



The lesson that I got from my 



walk was this : If the apples were 



^ ^, „ , , . , ,, not good and abundant it was not 



Fig. 4. — The Baldivin apt'lc Hoiu many , . , r 1 r , , , 



kinds of apples do you know? the fault of the trees, for they had 



done their part. 



In the cellar at home we have apples. I like to go into the cellar 

 at night with a lantern, and pick apples from this box and that, — plump 

 and big and round — and eat them where I stand. They are crisp and 

 cool, and the flesh snaps when I bite it and the juice is as fresh as the 

 water from a spring. There are many kinds of them, each kind known 

 by its own name, and some are red and some are green, some are round 

 and some are long, some are good and some are poor. 



Over and over, these apples in the cellar have been sorted, until 

 only the good ones are supposed to remain. Yet now and then T find a 

 decayed heart or a hollow place. The last one I picked up was fair and 

 handsome on the outside, but a black place and a little " sawdust " in 

 the blossom end made me suspicious of it. I cut it open. Here is what 

 I found (Fig. 6). Someone else had found the apple before T had. Last 

 summer a little moth had laid an t^^ on the growin^r apple, a worm had 

 come from the t^^ and had eaten and eaten into the apple, burrowing 

 through the core, until at last it was full grown, as shown in the picture. 

 Now it is preparing to escape. It has eaten a hole through the sid§ 



