Comfort Me with Apples 205 



vice of drunkenness received it with fanatic zeal. 

 It makes the heart of the Apple lover ache to read 

 that in this spirit they cut down whole orchards of 

 flourishing Apple trees, since they could conceive 

 no adequate use for their apples save for cider. 

 That any should have tried to exclude cider from 

 the list of intoxicating beverages seems barefaced 

 indeed to those who have tasted that most potent of 

 all spirits frozen cider. I once drank a small 

 modicum of Jericho cider, as smooth as Benedictine 

 and more persuasive, which made a raw day in April 

 seem like sunny midsummer. I afterward learned 

 from the ingenuous Long Island farmer whose hospi- 

 tality gave me this liqueur that it had been frozen 

 seven times. Each time he had thrust a red-hot 

 poker into the bung-hole of the barrel, melted all the 

 watery ice and poured it out ; therefore the very 

 essence of the cider was all that remained. 



It is interesting to note the folk customs of Old 

 England which have lingered here, such as domestic 

 love divinations. The poet Gay wrote : 



" I pare this Pippin round and round again, 

 My shepherd's name to flourish on the plain. 

 I fling th' unbroken paring o'er my head, 

 Upon the grass a perfect L. is read." 



I have seen New England schoolgirls, scores of 

 times, thus toss an " unbroken paring/' An ancient 

 trial of my youth was done with Apple seeds ; these 

 were named for various swains, then slightly wetted 

 and stuck on the cheek or forehead, while we 

 chanted : 



