Wild Apples by Henry David Thoreau (best non fiction books of all time TXT) 📕

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Wild Apples.

 

By Henry David Thoreau

 

THE HISTORY OF THE APPLE-TREE.

 

It is remarkable how closely the history of the Apple-tree is

connected with that of man. The geologist tells us that the order of

the Rosaceae, which includes the Apple, also the true Grasses, and

the Labiatae, or Mints, were introduced only a short time previous

to the appearance of man on the globe.

 

It appears that apples made a part of the food of that unknown

primitive people whose traces have lately been found at the bottom

of the Swiss lakes, supposed to be older than the foundation of

Rome, so old that they had no metallic implements. An entire black

and shrivelled Crab-Apple has been recovered from their stores.

 

Tacitus says of the ancient Germans that they satisfied their hunger

with wild apples, among other things.

 

Niebuhr [Footnote: A German historical critic of ancient life.]

observes that “the words for a house, a field, a plough, ploughing,

wine, oil, milk, sheep, apples, and others relating to agriculture

and the gentler ways of life, agree in Latin and Greek, while the

Latin words for all objects pertaining to war or the chase are

utterly alien from the Greek.” Thus the apple-tree may be considered

a symbol of peace no less than the olive.

 

The apple was early so important, and so generally distributed, that

its name traced to its root in many languages signifies fruit in

general. maelon (Melon), in Greek, means an apple, also the fruit of

other trees, also a sheep and any cattle, and finally riches in

general.

 

The apple-tree has been celebrated by the Hebrews, Greeks, Romans,

and Scandinavians. Some have thought that the first human pair were

tempted by its fruit. Goddesses are fabled to have contended for it,

dragons were set to watch it, and heroes were employed to pluck it.

[Footnote: The Greek myths especially referred to are The Choice of

Paris and The Apples of the Hesperides.]

 

The tree is mentioned in at least three places in the Old Testament,

and its fruit in two or three more. Solomon sings, “As the apple-tree among the trees of the wood, so is my beloved among the sons.”

And again, “Stay me with flagons, comfort me with apples.” The

noblest part of man’s noblest feature is named from this fruit, “the

apple of the eye.”

 

The apple-tree is also mentioned by Homer and Herodotus. Ulysses saw

in the glorious garden of Alcinous “pears and pomegranates and

apple-trees bearing beautiful fruit.” And according to Homer, apples

were among the fruits which Tantalus could not pluck, the wind ever

blowing their boughs away from him. Theophrastus knew and described

the apple-tree as a botanist.

 

According to the prose Edda, [Footnote: The stories of the early

Scandinavians.] “Iduna keeps in a box the apples which the gods,

when they feel old age approaching, have only to taste of to become

young again. It is in this manner that they will be kept in

renovated youth until Ragnarok” (or the destruction of the Gods).

 

I learn from Loudon [Footnote: An English authority on the culture

of orchards and gardens.] that “the ancient Welsh bards were

rewarded for excelling in song by the token of the apple-spray;” and

“in the Highlands of Scotland the apple-tree is the badge of the

clan Lamont.”

 

The apple-tree belongs chiefly to the northern temperate zone.

Loudon says, that “it grows spontaneously in every part of Europe

except the frigid zone, and throughout Western Asia, China and

Japan.” We have also two or three varieties of the apple indigenous

in North America. The cultivated apple-tree was first introduced

into this country by the earliest settlers, and is thought to do as

well or better here than anywhere else. Probably some of the

varieties which are now cultivated were first introduced into

Britain by the Romans.

 

Pliny, adopting the distinction of Theophrastus, says, “Of trees

there are some which are altogether wild, some more civilized.”

Theophrastus includes the apple among the last; and, indeed, it is

in this sense the most civilized of all trees. It is as harmless as

a dove, as beautiful as a rose, and as valuable as flocks and herds.

It has been longer cultivated than any other, and so is more

humanized; and who knows but, like the dog, it will at length be no

longer traceable to its wild original? It migrates with man, like

the dog and horse and cow; first, perchance, from Greece to Italy,

thence to England, thence to America; and our Western emigrant is

still marching steadily toward the setting sun with the seeds of the

apple in his pocket, or perhaps a few young trees strapped to his

load. At least a million apple-trees are thus set farther westward

this year than any cultivated ones grew last year. Consider how the

Blossom-Week, like the Sabbath, is thus annually spreading over the

prairies; for when man migrates he carries with him not only his

birds, quadrupeds, insects, vegetables, and his very sward, but his

orchard also.

 

The leaves and tender twigs are an agreeable food to many domestic

animals, as the cow, horse, sheep, and goat; and the fruit is sought

after by the first, as well as by the hog. Thus there appears to

have existed a natural alliance between these animals and this tree

from the first. “The fruit of the Crab in the forests of France” is

said to be “a great resource for the wild boar.”

 

Not only the Indian, but many indigenous insects, birds, and

quadrupeds, welcomed the apple-tree to these shores. The tent-caterpillar saddled her eggs on the very first twig that was formed,

and it has since shared her affections with the wild cherry; and the

canker-worm also in a measure abandoned the elm to feed on it. As it

grew apace, the bluebird, robin, cherry-bird, king-bird, and many

more, came with haste and built their nests and warbled in its

boughs, and so became orchard-birds, and multiplied more than ever.

It was an era in the history of their race. The downy woodpecker

found such a savory morsel under its bark, that he perforated it in

a ring quite round the tree before be left it,—a thing which he had

never done before, to my knowledge. It did not take the partridge

long to find out how sweet its buds were, and every winter eve she

flew, and still flies, from the wood, to pluck them, much to the

farmer’s sorrow. The rabbit, too, was not slow to learn the taste of

its twigs and bark; and when the fruit was ripe, the squirrel half-rolled, half-carried it to his hole; and even the musquash crept up

the bank from the brook at evening, and greedily devoured it, until

he had worn a path in the grass there; and when it was frozen and

thawed, the crow and the jay were glad to taste it occasionally. The

owl crept into the first apple-tree that became hollow, and fairly

hooted with delight, finding it just the place for him; so, settling

down into it, he has remained there ever since.

 

My theme being the Wild Apple, I will merely glance at some of the

seasons in the annual growth of the cultivated apple, and pass on to

my special province.

 

The flowers of the apple are perhaps the most beautiful of any tree,

so copious and so delicious to both sight and scent. The walker is

frequently tempted to turn and linger near some more than usually

handsome one, whose blossoms are two thirds expanded. How superior

it is in these respects to the pear, whose blossoms are neither

colored nor fragrant!

 

By the middle of July, green apples are so large as to remind us of

coddling, and of the autumn. The sward is commonly strewed with

little ones which fall still-born, as it were,—Nature thus thinning

them for us. The Roman writer Palladius said: “If apples are

inclined to fall before their time, a stone placed in a split root

will retain them.” Some such notion, still surviving, may account

for some of the stones which we see placed to be overgrown in the

forks of trees. They have a saying in Suffolk, England,—

 

“At Michaelmas time, or a little before,

Half an apple goes to the core.”

 

Early apples begin to be ripe about the first of August; but I think

that none of them are so good to eat as some to smell. One is worth

more to scent your handkerchief with than any perfume which they

sell in the shops. The fragrance of some fruits is not to be

forgotten, along with that of flowers. Some gnarly apple which I

pick up in the road reminds me by