Page:A book of the west; being an introduction to Devon and Cornwall.djvu/125

Rh is bright with crimson and gold as though it were studded with jewels, but the jewels are the windfalls from the apple trees. Men, women, and children are happy talking, laughing, singing snatches of songs—except when eating. Eat they must—eat they will—and the farmer does not object, for there is a limit to apple-eating. The apple is the most filling of all fruit. And yet how unlimited seems the appetite of the boy, especially when he gets into an orchard! The grandfather of the writer of this book planted an orchard specially for the boys of the parish, in the hope that they would glut themselves therein and leave his cider orchard alone. It did not answer; they devoured all the apples in their special orchard and carried their ravages into his also.

The farmer knows that the apple is tempting, and the apple-pickers and collectors are allowed to eat—within limits. But he can afford to be generous. In a good year how abundant is the supply on every tree! How every tree resembles those that Aladdin saw in the enchanted world underground laden with topaz and ruby!

There was a curious custom in Devon, now completely gone out, which consisted, on Old Christmas Day, in going at night into an orchard and firing blank charges from fowling-pieces at the apple trees. It was supposed that this ensured there being a good harvest of apples the ensuing year. In Somersetshire the wassailing of the trees continued till within the memory of old folk. Sir Thomas Acland related to Mr. Brand, in 1790, that in his neighbourhood on Christmas Eve it was customary for the country