Under the Old Apple-tree 49 



ing yet? You know the one I mean — that one with 

 those big, mellow, sweet apples with a flavour like 

 ambrosia and nectarine mixed. I think about 

 those apples every time I see or eat an apple and 

 wish I could get a taste, like those gave me, once 

 more." 



Of course, it's quite likely, there are just as 

 good apples on earth now but the joys of boyhood 

 were associated with those he and I talked about, 

 and that makes a vast difference. 



THE FAVOUKITE APPLE-TEEE 



I've read that in the dim and distant past men 

 worshipped trees. I could find it in my heart to 

 forgive a man for idolatry of this kind if it were 

 such a tree as I knew in my boyhood hours. As a 

 baby I toddled about in the grass under its shade 

 and as a boy I climbed it. 



*'But th' or tree's dyin', 

 An' th' birds 11 come a-cryin' 

 Fer their nesses, in its branches, 



in th' early spring in vain: 

 An' ther' can't be any apples 

 Like them sweet yeller apples 

 'At grew in our farm orchard — 



an' ther' won't never be again." 



A "memoky" tree 



I suppose that every boy who has been raised on 

 a farm and, somehow, wanders off into town or 



