:appie0 



WELL do I remember one of the ad- 

 monitions of my youth, brought upon 

 me by an attempt to take apple -blos- 

 soms from a tree in bloom because they were 

 beautiful. I was told that it was wrong to 

 pluck for any purpose the flowers of fruit 

 trees, because the possible fruitage might 

 thereby be reduced. That is, feeding the eye 

 was improper, but it was always in order to 

 conserve all the possibilities for another organ 

 of the body. In those days we had not 

 learned that nature provides against contingen- 

 cies, and that not one -tenth of all the blos- 

 soms would be needed to "set" as much 

 fruit as the tree could possibly mature. 



The app!e, well called the king of fruits, 

 is worthy of all admiration as a fruit; but I 

 do not see why that need interfere in the 

 least with its consideration as an object of 

 beauty. On the contrary, such consideration is 



75 



