92 On Apple Trees and Graftirif^. 



whom then lived in the neighbourhood ; they used all 

 to frequent it and carry off blankets full of apples. 



A very aged Squaw amongst them who from senio- 

 rity ^^^as deemed either their priestess or queen^ quite 

 gray headed, and who pretended to remember JVilliam 

 Penn, used to say, that when the Indians sold their land 

 they did not sell their good old apple ti'ee^ therefore they 

 claimed the apples, and had no opposition from the pro- 

 prietor ; the Indians almost worshipped that tree, and 

 I remember hearing the aged squaw say, that when the 

 '' Great Spirit made that apple tree for poor Indians, he 

 made the apples ripe all summer;" — they had a tra- 

 dition amongst them, that the tree was older than the 

 European settlementy and I am fully inclined to believe 

 their ideas correct :— sometime past I was informed by 

 a friend of mine living near where the tree stood, that 

 it became hollow, and hath been dead and gone for 

 some years past ; my worthy father taught me before 

 seven years old to graft an apple tree, which art I have 

 practised very largely, being the only person within 50 

 miles round that understood it, and have taught it to 

 many people in this country. 



The first pence I ever earned when young, was by 

 grafting apple trees for our neighbours ; 1 then took 

 grafts off the far famed Toivnsend tree : since I raised 

 trees in this country from the seeds and began to graft, 

 my greatest desire was to obtain grafts of that kind. I 

 therefore wrote to a much younger brother living in the 

 neighbourhood to make all diligent enquiry through the 

 neighbourhood for a tree of that kind, he did so, and 

 found one w^hich the owners assured him was the real 

 kind, yet it w^as on the decline. This confirms me in thy 



