STATE POMOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 107 



yearly rounci, and in extreme instances the two ends of the year 

 meet with apples still upon the table. Like bread, one never tires 

 of the apple. Of what other fruit of the tropics or the temperate 

 climate can it be said that everybody' likes it at all times of the 

 year? Pears, plums, grapes, oranges, figs, dates, — run through the 

 entire list, and the apple will outlast them all. While tlie market is 

 supplied with corky oranges, picked under-ripe, or with canned and 

 preserved fruits from different climes, us insipid as they are costly, 

 the northern-grown and northern-iipened apple, lull to the bursting 

 of the stored-up richness of the ripening autumn sun, takes its 

 place on the fruit stands — a whole length ahead of them all, cheap 

 in price, and appealing to the satisfaction of every taste. 



Of all the English-speaking writers, I think John liurronghs has 

 given to our api)le its best '"•cliaiacter." I have hunted in vain, 

 through the whole body of our hoi'ticnltural and poetic literature, for 

 a better description of it than this charming autlior has given, but I 

 fail to find it. If I were a good reader I would ask you to listen 

 while I read yon a few pages of his delightful word-painting of 

 this most magnificent fruit. As it is, will 30U listen to a few sen- 

 tences ? 



"The apple is the commonest and yet the most varied and beau- 

 tiful of fruits. A dish of them is as becoming to the center-table in 

 winlei' as was the vase of flowers in summer — a bouquet of Spitzen- 

 bergs and Greenings and Northern Spies. A rose when it blooms, 

 the apple is a rose when it ripens. It pleases ever}' sense to which 

 it can be addressed — the touch, the smell, the sight, the taste ; and 

 when it falls, in the still October days, it pleases the ear. It is a call 

 to the banquet, it is a signal that the feast is readj'. * * * How 

 pleasing to the touch. I love to stroke its polished rondure with my 

 hand, to carry it in my pocket on my tramp over the winter hills, or 

 thi'ough the early spring woods. You are company, you red-cheeked 

 Spitz, or you salmon-fleshed Greening. I toy with you, press your 

 face to mine, toss 30U in the air, roll 3'ou on the ground, see you 

 shine out where you lie amid the moss and dry leaves and sticks. 

 You are so alive ! You glow like a ruddy flower. Yon look so 

 animated, I almost expect to see you move ! I postpone the eating 

 of 30U, 3'ou are so beautiful ! How compact! how exquisitely 

 tinted! Stained by the sun, and varnished against the rains. * * * 

 Noble, common fruit, best friend of man and most loved by him, 

 following him like his dog or his cow, wherever he goes. His home- 



