Comfort Me with Apples 197 
and might be chosen as the totem of the white set- 
tlers. Our love for the Apple is natural, for it was 
the characteristic fruit of Britain ; the clergy were 
its chief cultivators ; they grew Apples in their mon- 
astery gardens, prayed for them in special religious 
ceremonies, sheltered the fruit by laws, and even 
“The valley stretching below 
Is white with blossoming Apple trees, as if touched with lightest snow.” 
named the Apple when pronouncing the blessings 
of God upon their princes and rulers. 
Thoreau described an era of luxury as one in 
which men cultivate the Apple and the amenities of 
the garden. He thought it indicated relaxed nerves 
to read gardening books, and he regarded garden- 
ing as a civil and social function, not a love of 
nature. He tells of his own love for freedom and 
savagery — and he found what he so deemed at 
