Wild Apples | Page 6

occupy the
heaven of the gods without knowing it. When I see a particularly mean man carrying a
load of fair and fragrant early apples to market, I seem to see a contest going on between
him and his horse, on the one side, and the apples on the other, and, to my mind, the
apples always gain it. Pliny says that apples are the heaviest of all things, and that the
oxen begin to sweat at the mere sight of a load of them. Our driver begins to lose his load
the moment he tries to transport them to where they do not belong, that is, to any but the
most beautiful. Though he gets out from time to time, and feels of them, and thinks they
are all there, I see the stream of their evanescent and celestial qualities going to heaven
from his cart, while the pulp and skin and core only are going to market. They are not
apples, but pomace. Are not these still Iduna's apples, the taste of which keeps the gods
forever young? and think you that they will let Loki or Thjassi carry them off to
Jotunheim, [Footnote: Jotunheim (Ye(r)t'- un-hime) in Scandinavian mythology was the
home of the Jotun or Giants. Loki was a descendant of the gods, and a companion of the
Giants. Thjassi (Tee-assy) was a giant.] while they grow wrinkled and gray? No, for
Ragnarok, or the destruction of the gods, is not yet.
There is another thinning of the fruit, commonly near the end of August or in September,
when the ground is strewn with windfalls; and this happens especially when high winds
occur after rain. In some orchards you may see fully three quarters of the whole crop on
the ground, lying in a circular form beneath the trees, yet hard and green,--or, if it is a
hillside, rolled far down the hill. However, it is an ill wind that blows nobody any good.

All the country over, people are busy picking up the windfalls, and this will make them
cheap for early apple-pies.
In October, the leaves falling, the apples are more distinct on the trees. I saw one year in
a neighboring town some trees fuller of fruit than I remember to have ever seen before,
small yellow apples hanging over the road. The branches were gracefully drooping with
their weight, like a barberry-bush, so that the whole tree acquired a new character. Even
the topmost branches, instead of standing erect, spread and drooped in all directions; and
there were so many poles supporting the lower ones, that they looked like pictures of
banian-trees. As an old English manuscript says, "The mo appelen the tree bereth the
more sche boweth to the folk."
Surely the apple is the noblest of fruits. Let the most beautiful or the swiftest have it. That
should be the "going" price of apples.
Between the fifth and twentieth of October I see the barrels lie under the trees. And
perhaps I talk with one who is selecting some choice barrels to fulfil an order. He turns a
specked one over many times before he leaves it out. If I were to tell what is passing in
my mind, I should say that every one was specked which he had handled; for he rubs off
all the bloom, and those fugacious ethereal qualities leave it. Cool evenings prompt the
farmers to make haste, and at length I see only the ladders here and there left leaning
against the trees.
It would be well if we accepted these gifts with more joy and gratitude, and did not think
it enough simply to put a fresh load of compost about the tree. Some old English customs
are suggestive at least. I find them described chiefly in Brand's "Popular Antiquities." It
appears that "on Christmas eve the farmers and their men in Devonshire take a large bowl
of cider, with a toast in it, and carrying it in state to the orchard, they salute the apple-
trees with much ceremony, in order to make them bear well the next season." This
salutation consists in "throwing some of the cider about the roots of the tree, placing bits
of the toast on the branches," and then, "encircling one of the best bearing trees in the
orchard, they drink the following toast three several times:--
"'Here's to thee, old apple-tree, Whence thou mayst bud, and whence thou mayst blow,
And whence thou mayst bear apples enow! Hats-full! caps-full! Bushel, bushel, sacks-full!
And my pockets full, too! Hurra!'"
Also what was called "apple-howling" used to be practised in various counties of
England on New-Year's eve. A troop of boys visited the different orchards, and,
encircling the apple-trees, repeated the following words:--
"Stand fast, root! bear well, top!