Sweet Cider and '' Applesass'' 145 



cider would be improved and made fit for use 

 throughout the year. There were many ways of 

 treating it, and it was not impossible to get a 

 fairly sumptuous ''jag" by imbibing ''hard" cider 

 freely. There used to be a drink known as * ' apple- 

 jack" whiskey, a form of cider, I suppose, but I 

 have no intimate knowledge of such a beverage, 

 but I've partaken of sweet cider from a barrel by 

 the bunghole and straw route which was a very 

 popular and pleasurable recreation with the boys 

 in my day. 



THE OLD CIDER MILL 



I memorised some verses once on **The Old 

 Cider Mill." I don't know who let them trickle 

 out. He'd got himself so worked up making them, 

 I guess, that he hurried off to the cider barrel for 

 a drink without signing his name. Maybe I can- 

 not give them just as written but as nearly as I 

 can recall them they ran: 



If I could be a boy again 

 For fifteen minutes, or even ten, 

 I'd make a bee-line for that old mill, 

 Hidden by tangled vines down by the rill, 

 Where the apples were piled in heaps all 'round, 

 Red streaked and yellow, all over the ground; 

 And the old sleepy horse goes 'round and 'round 

 And turns the wheels while the apples are ground. 



Straight for that old cider mill I 'd start, 

 With light bare feet, and a lighter heart. 



