32 CRAB APPLE. 



waking, a sweet apple in liis hand, as its odour 

 was considered healthful. The old herbalist, 

 Gerarde, also tells us of a valuable ointment 

 made in his time of the pulp of apples, lard, 

 and rose water, which was called pomatum, 

 from ponmm, an apple, and was used to beau- 

 tify the skin. Before the introduction of the 

 hop into this country, cider was in much more 

 general use than it is now ; and old writers 

 complain that the use of that plant had " trans- 

 muted our wholesome baverage into beer." 

 Cider appears to have been a drink of very old 

 use in this country, and is probably the Sieder 

 of the ancient Britons. There is no doubt 

 that the Apple was cultivated in this land by 

 the Anglo-Saxons ; and it is now planted 

 throughout Europe as far as the sixtieth degree 

 of latitude, and in the temperate parts of Asia, 

 and North and South America. It has been 

 observed that the Apple will flourish in the 

 open air in every land in which oaks thrive. 

 The fruit mentioned in Scripture as the Apple 

 is probably the citron. 



