APPLE. 27 



on. When forked flames strike up through the mass to the 

 surface, you may safely take the blower off. 



The ashes from anthracite coal will make neither soap 

 nor ley. 



ANTISEPTICS, n. Substances which prevent or check 

 putrefaction (Worcester). Some of the most powerful of 

 these preservative agents are alcohol, oils, acids, camphor, 

 charcoal, chlorine, tannin, resins, sugar, bitumen, and salts of 

 different kinds. 



The mode by which they resist and retard decay has never 

 been fully explained. In some cases, as in leather, they 

 seem to combine with the material to be preserved, and 

 probably in other cases they absorb the decomposing gases 

 and agents. 



Lumps of charcoal put about birds and meat will tend to 

 keep them sweet, but will hardly restore what is already 

 tainted. 



For the preservation of vegetable and animal substances, 

 sugar, alcohol, salt, acetic acid or vinegar, and pyroligneous 

 acids are used ; but antiseptics for the preservation of sci- 

 entific specimens and labors are resinous and bituminous 

 varnishes, alum, alcohol, oil of turpentine, and corrosive 1 

 sublimate. 



APPLE (Pyrus Malus). It is a curious fact, that all our 

 apples have originated from a species of crab which is native 

 to Europe, and not from our native crabs. The seeds of the 

 species brought by the European colonists to America have, 

 through the influences of culture, soil, and climate, succeeded 

 in giving us the finest apple in the world. Mr. Downing 

 has remarked, that the apple-tree is " most perfectly natural- 

 ized in America, and in the northern and middle portions of 

 the United States succeeds as well, or, as we believe, better 



