Page 6 



BETTER FHUIT 



/ 'ircciiihcr 



before any language was reiluced to 

 writing, that no one linows what was 

 the origin of the word in that form. 

 The Latin language had two names for 

 it, pomum and malum. You will find 

 malum very little used in any modern 

 language, although melon is another 

 form of it, meaning a large round fruit 

 like an apple, but pomum originally 

 applying to all fruit became more par- 

 ticularly applied to the apple because 

 then, as now, it was esteemed the 

 most valuable and healthful fruit given 

 to man. 



From thai word pomum came all 

 kinds of queer words whose origin you 

 would scarcely associate with it. For 

 example, a word nobody would ever 

 associate with apples is i)omade, as used 

 in any barber sho]). Yet pomade had 

 its origin in your special and favorite 

 fruit, the ajjple, because in classic times 

 the Cireek and Roman ladies used to 

 dress their hair with pomade. Of 

 course ladies never use that sort of 

 thing today. %Vell, in those days the 

 fashionable feminine hair dressers did 

 use pomade, and it has been called 

 pomade ever since because one favorite 

 dressing for the hair and face was juice 

 extracted fi'om the apple, with certain 

 otbei- ingredients. In similar fashion 

 are derived from the Latin name for 

 apple the pommel of a sword and the 

 pommel of a saddle, the round objeel 

 which rises up on the saddle, and the 

 apple-shaped ball at the extremity of 

 the old-fashioned sword hilt. The 

 word inuumeling comes not from the 

 apple itself but from the ponnuel of a 

 sword. It originally meant to strike a 

 man in the face with the ijonunel of a 

 sword instead of slashing him with the 

 blade. Thus, you see, in more senses 

 than one, the apple has been at the root 

 of discord from the days of antiquity 

 'til now. 



.Another use of the word aople is 

 familial- to you through the old Knglish 

 word for tomato, "love apple." Did 

 you ever happen to hear the reas(m 

 why tomatoes a hundred years ago in 

 New England, in fact all over the 

 country and in old England as well, 

 were called love apples? .Some old- 

 fashioned people, like myself, can re- 

 member the time when our mothers 

 always called tomatoes love apples. 

 Thev were cultivated as garden jjlants 

 in Old and New England because the 

 fruit was Ijeautiful, and for years many 

 people thought the fruit unwholesome. 

 It was a Mexican jilant in origin and 

 utterly unknown to Europe until after 

 the voyages of Columbus. It is an .\ztec 

 plant. The original name for it was 

 tomatl, but the pronunciation of the 

 final "1" was extremely dillicult in 

 Spanish mouths; so the Si)aniaids 

 called it tomato. 



Incidentally, of course, the wild fruit 

 was very much smaller than the culti- 

 vated fruit is today. There was also 

 a second Sjjanish name. The Spaniard 

 uses the word "moro" in the same 

 sense that some .Americans and Eng- 

 lishmen use the word "nigger," a word 

 which I hate because it is used in a 

 derr)gatorv sense. Y'et you know some 

 sailors of both English speaking na- 



tions are in the habit of using tliat word 

 to mean not merely an\' black person 

 but any person that is not a white man. 

 In the Far East sailors so designate a 

 Hindu, for instance, or a Filipino, or 

 any person that is not a Caucasian. In 

 the same way "moro" in the Spanish 

 language means any person that is not 

 a pure-blooded white. The second 

 Spanish name of the tomato was "the 

 apple of the moor," or, translated into 

 P'nglish slang (I apologize for the use 

 of the word) "nigger apple." Very 

 well, there is a word in French which 

 very nuich resembles moro, but has a 

 ver\- (liflTerent and much more charm- 

 ing meaning, "amour," and the French, 

 hearing the name of this new fruit as 

 apples "de moro," thought it was apples 

 "d'amour," and consecpiently called the 

 fruit "ponnue d'amour," apples of love, 

 which the English translated into love 

 apples, an old name which has contin- 

 ued in the back country districts down 

 to this very day, suggesting that if 

 apples are active in promoting discord 

 they also may promote love. 



There are many other stories con- 

 nected with the apple from the very 

 dawn of history. Of course the most 

 familiar apple story is of the origin of 

 the race in the first chapter of the Old 

 Testament, the story of .Adam and Eve, 

 where the apjile is mentioned as a 

 temiitation, not merely on account of 

 its, shall 1 say magical powers, but also 

 because of its attractions as a delicaev. 



In similar fashion story after story in 

 Greek mythology rests on the apple. 

 Y'ou will remember the particular one 

 of the apple of discord to which I have 

 already referred. AVith names changed 

 a little it is exactly like those idd Cer- 

 man house stories, "hausmarchen," as 

 they are calle<l, which were collected 

 b\' the brothers (irimm, where at some 

 splendid wedding of a prince and 

 Ijrincess the wicked fairy comes in and 

 spoils the entire happiness of the occa- 

 sion, but incidentally does some service 

 by furnishing the plot of the story. 

 Thus at the marriage of Thetis and 

 Peleus tiie goddess Discord arrived, 

 not having been invited to the feast, and 

 presented as a wedding gift a golden 

 apple on which was inscribed, "For the 

 most beautiful," and the three god- 

 desses, Minerva, .luno, the wife of 

 .Jupiter and Queen of the goddesses, and 

 Venus competed as to which was the 

 most beautiful. Even in those days 

 bribery of voters apparently seems to 

 have been known. Paris, you will re- 

 member, the Prince of Troy, was estab- 

 lished as the umpire, and after they 

 were through everybody wanted to kill 

 the umpire in the good old style of the 

 fans. Each goddess otfered Paris a gift 

 if he would give her the apijle, and he 

 finally chose Venus as the most beauti- 

 ful because she had jiromised to give 

 him to wife the most beautiful woman 

 in the woild. He chose Helen, who 

 was the wife of another gentleman, but 

 apparently that made no dilference, and 

 in the attempt to recover Helen the 

 Greeks invaded Troy and the Trojan 

 war came about. So, if the apple lies 

 at the root of all our religion, an apple 



also lay at the root of lemote antitpii- 

 t.\'s greatest war. 



There are many other stories I might 

 relate to you from Greek mythology. 

 Y'ou will remendjer the celebrated foot 

 race in which one Greek woman was 

 even then demanding to be put on a 

 par with man. I don't think .she de- 

 manded a vote, but she managed to beat 

 all the men that competed with her 

 until she became famous as the cham- 

 pion runner. Her name was .Atlanta. 

 .At last she was beaten, not through 

 man's superior skill but through man's 

 superior guile, for Hippomenes, who 

 competed with her in the race, carried 

 three beautiful apples in his hand and 

 whenever she was outstri|)ping him he 

 dropped an apple. The woman, in 

 (ireek as well as in .lewish history, was 

 too much temi)ted by the apple to fol- 

 low the straight and narrow course, 

 and every time he dropped an apple 

 she stopped to seize it. Thus Hip- 

 pomenes won. .After the race he took a 

 terrible risk and married Atlanta, whom 

 he had defeated; so she met her match 

 in lioth senses at the same time. 



.\nother story concerns the Hes- 

 peridcs, once supposed to be fabulous, 

 but now believed to be the actual con- 

 tinent of .Atlantis and which some 

 archaeologists have re-establshed in 

 the middle of the .Atlantic Ocean. The 

 golden ai)ples of the llesperides, those 

 western islands in the Greek legends, 

 the great source of civilization where 

 all was peace and comfort and happi- 

 ness, sometimes called the Islands of 

 the Blessed, were said to lie olT the 

 Portuguese coast to the west of what 

 are now the Azores. The .\ztecs of 

 .America had a tradition of a similar 

 abode of the gods lying in the same 

 place. The deeo-sea dredgings of His 

 Majesty's ship Challenger have shown 

 that the ocean bottom at that place is a 

 great table land, rising sharply from 

 the lower depths nearly to the surfac<' 

 and covered with signs of volcanic 

 eru]jtions. It is more than possible, 

 therefore, that this continent did exist 

 and was destroyed by volcanic eruji- 

 tions and earth<|uakes, as we have seen 

 smaller islands destroyed in our day. 



(^n these Hesperides, these so-called 

 fabled but probably existing islands in 

 the West, there was, according tn the 

 story, a wonderful tree of golden 

 ai)ples guarded by a dragon with a 

 hundred heads. The Twelfth Labor 

 laid upon Hercules, the demigod of 

 classic mythology, was to go forth and 

 sla\ this hundred-headed dragon and 

 to bring back some of these golden 

 apples. He reached the island, killed 

 the dragon and returned with the 

 aijples. 



Greek and Oriental mxlhology and 

 nnstery are not, however, the (mly 

 places where the apple has been so 

 honored as the emblem of health. In 

 like manner our .American "supersti- 

 lion" with the old verse, handed down 

 Irom England, ".An a])ple a day keeps 

 the doctor away," has an oiigin in no 

 sui)erstition at all. The use of the apple 

 does promote health and the modern 

 medical fact is recorded in the myth- 

 ologv of all kinds of nations all over 



