68 THE APPLE. 



sliould be placed on tiers on their sides, and the cellar should be 

 kept as dark as possible. In such a cellar, one of the largest 

 apple growers in Dutchess county is able to keep the Greening 

 apple, which, in the fruit room, usually decays in January, until 

 the 1st of April, in the freshest and finest condition. Some per- 

 sons place a layer of clean rye straw between every layer of 

 apples, when packing them in the barrels. 



Apples are frequently kept by farmers in pits or ridges in the 

 ground, covered with straw^ and a layer of earth, in the same 

 manner as potatoes, but it is an inferior method, and the fruit 

 very speedily decays when opened to the air. The English ap- 

 ple growers lay their fruit in heaps, in cool dry cellars, and 

 cover them with straw. 



AVhen apples are exported, each fruit in the barrel should be 

 wrapped in clean coarse paper, and the barrels should be placed 

 in a dry, airy place, between decks. 



Cider. To make the finest cider, apples should be chosen 

 which are especially suited to this purpose. The fruit should 

 be gathered about the first of November, and coarse cloths or 

 straw should be laid under the tree to secure them against 

 bruising when they are shaken from the tree. If the w^eather 

 is fine the fruit is allowed to lie in heaps in the open air, or in 

 airy sheds or lofts for some time, till it is thoroughly ripened. 

 All immature and rotten fruit should then be rejected, and the 

 remainder ground in the mill as nearly as possible to an uni- 

 form mass. This pulp should now remain in the vat from 24 

 to 48 hours, or even longer if the weather is cool, in order to 

 heighten the colour and increase the saccharine principle. It 

 is then put into the press (without wetting the straw,) from 

 whence the liquor is strained through hair cloth or sieves, into 

 perfectly clean, sweet, sound casks. The casks, with the bung 

 out, are then placed in a- cool cellar, or in a sheltered place in 

 the open air. Here the fermentation commences, and as the 

 pomace and froth work out of the bung-hole, the casks must be 

 filled up every day with some of the same pressing, kept in a 

 cask for this pui-pose. In two or three weeks this rising will 

 cease, when the first fermentation is over, and the bung should, 

 at first, be put in loosely — then, in a day or two, driven in tight 

 — leaving a small vent hole near it, which may also be stopped 

 in a few days after. If the casks are in a cool airy cellar, the 

 fermentation will cease in a day or tw^o, and this state may be 

 known by the liquor becoming clear and bright, by the cessa- 

 tion of the discharge of fixed air, and by the thick crust which 

 has collected on the surface. The clear cider should now be 

 drawn off" and placed in a clean cask. If the cider, which must 

 be carefully watched in this state to prevent the fermentation 

 going too far, remains quiet, it may be allowed to stand till 

 spring, and the addition at first of about a gill of finely powdered 



