MARKETING AND STORING FRUIT. I2Q 



school in Virginia, my native state. There were quite a num- 

 ber of large apple orchards in the country around, two of 

 which were on very rocky hillsides covered with grass, and, 

 being only about two miles from the school, it was a common 

 thing for several boys to club together and buy one or more 

 bushels of apples at twenty-five cents a bushel, dig a large, 

 deep hole on a hillside in the woods, then cover the bottom 

 with dry leaves, on which the apples were poured from sacks. 

 When about two-thirds full, we drew in L good lot more of 

 leaves, after which the hole was filled with soil, tramped 

 firmly and rounded up to shed the rain. This primitive cold 

 storage plant went by the name of an " apple den," and when 

 finished was top-dressed again with leaves to hide it and left 

 with the utmost confidence born of experience, that late in 

 winter and early spring, when apples were scarce, we would 

 find ours all safe and sound. Nor were we ever disappointed, 

 for when we opened a small hole on the lower side, there 

 would be the big red apples smiling at us, and what a delight- 

 ful odor and flavor ! Once opened, we would go every few 

 days, fill our pockets and stick a wad of straw in the hole un- 

 til the next visit. I remember well that toward the last, some- 

 times, heavy rains would wash the soil down among the apples 

 so that often they were so covered with dirt, when dug, that 

 they had to be washed before eating ; and yet it was a rare 

 thing to find a rotten apple. 



Now, there was my first experience with sod fruit, repeated 

 every winter regularly for five years, with the same results ; 

 and little did I think that it was destined to get me into the 

 fight of my life nearly sixty years afterward. So when, last 

 November, the recollection of those miniature cold-storage 

 houses came back to me, the secret of the long-keeping qual- 

 ity of the fruit was plain, and it occurred to me to play school- 

 boy once more, and see what my sod apples here would do. 

 Accordingly, I dug a hole under my house in the moist earth, 

 about eighteen inches deep, covered the bottom with hay, laid 

 one dozen Terry Winter apples upon it and a piece of stiff 

 cardboard on the apples, after which I filled the hole with 

 loose earth to keep them from freezing. That was in Novem- 



