62 THE APPLE-TREE 



were destroyed by fire. So the apple came early to be a 

 standby on the new continent. 



The apples of the colonists were not all for eating, 

 but for drinking. The butts and barrels of cider put in 

 cellars in the early times seem to us most surprising. 

 Herein are suggestions of old social customs that might 

 lead us into interesting historical excursions. The oldest 

 book. I possess on the apple is "Vinetum Britannicum: or, 

 a Treatise of Cider," published in London in 1676; it 

 treats also of other beverages made from fruits and of 

 "the newly-invented ingenio or mill, for the more expedi- 

 tious and better making of cider." The gradual change 

 in customs, whereby the eating of the apple (rather than 

 the drinking of it) has come to be paramount, is a signi-- 

 ficant development ; the use of apple-juice may now pro- 

 ceed on another basis, on the principle of preservation 

 and pasteurization rather than of fermentation. 



It is the custom to call the apple Pyrus Malus. This is 

 the name given by the great Linnaeus, with whom the 

 modern accurate naming of plants and animals begins. The 

 nomenclature of plants starts with his "Species Plantarum," 

 1753. Pyrus is the genus or group comprising the pears 

 and apples, and Linnaeus included the quince; Malus 

 is Latin for the apple-tree. Together the names represent 

 genus and species, — ^the malus Pyrus. 



These statements are easy enough to make, but it is 

 impossible to demonstrate whether the common pomologi- 

 cal apples are derived from one original species or from 

 two or more. Many technical botanical names have been 

 given in the group, but we need not pause with them here. 

 It is enough for our purpose to know that the natural-his- 

 tory of the apple, as of anything else that runs to time 



