140 THE APPLE. 



none, and you make no nocturnal visits to his or- 

 chard ; when your lunch-basket is without them and 

 you can pass a winter's night by the fireside with no 

 thought of the fruit at your elbow, then be assured 

 you are no longer a boy, either in heart or years. 



The genuine apple-eater comforts himself with an 

 apple in their season as others with a pipe or cigar. 

 When he has nothing else to do, or is bored, he eats 

 an apple. While he is waiting for the train he eats 

 an apple, sometimes several of them. When he 

 takes a walk he arms himself with apples. His trav- 

 eling bag is full of apples. He offers an apple to 

 his companion, and takes one himself. They are his 

 chief solace when on the road. He sows their seed 

 all along the route. He tosses the core from the car 

 window and from the top of the stage-coach. He 

 would, in time, make the land one vast orchard. He 

 dispenses with a knife. He prefers that his teeth 

 shall have the first taste. Then he knows the best 

 flavor is immediately beneath the skin, and that in a 

 pared apple this is lost. If you will stew the apple, 

 he says, instead of baking it, by all means leave 

 the skin on. It improves the color and vastly height- 

 ens the flavor of the dish. 



The apple is a masculine fruit ; hence women are 

 poor apple-eaters. It belongs to the open air, and 

 requires an open air taste and relish. 



I instantly sympathized with that clergyman I 

 read of, who on pulling out his pocket-handkerchief 

 in the midst of his discourse, pulled out two bounc- 



