Litchfield enquirer., 1864-12-08

which he will not clear half as much money a: from an score of apple trees. An apple tree sometimes lives two hundred years, and grows to an immense size. One upon MT. Beechert place, which very aged people called the oit apple tree when they were children, measures fourteen feet six inches in circumference. Hs has genuine reverence for such an old tree.- Every time he looks out upon it his mind goe' l back to the time that Putnam's soldiers were encamped under and around that old tree l which they treated with such reverence that i 1 lived through the trying scenes of the Revolu tionsry War, ana furnished fruit and shade te its heroes-probably to Washington himself Mir. Beecher then treated at length of the uni versal uses of the apple, and exhibited most | glowing and youthful love for an apple pie.- Some of it's varieties live through the winter and round to the time of ripeuing of other sorts in summer. The peach is the fruit oi a day, the apple of all days. For it, we never lose our relish Tor 1t the appetite is meter cloyed and unlike other food. exces. slve eating of apples never produces dyspep- sia. When he Was boy upon the hills ot Connecticut, it would have been thought as easy to cloy the village mill as a boys stom- ach with apples. It was not considered any great feat to eat six, eight or twelve of an ever ing and how often he has been down to the great bin in the cellar and brou ght up apples by the hatfu-a boys hat, that al mosi universal and most convenient basket!
 In those times 1t was almost a pleasure to be sick, for then he was treated with roasted aDples-roasted, not baked in stove-roast- ed before the old fashioned kitchen fire. To i'll the stomachs of yoracious children there is nothing like apples. There is no end to their uses in housewifery. The apple is the germ of civilization in the kitchen. It should be eaten upon All tables; it is not so half enough, It should be eaten with meat a. well as after meat. It can be made to serve as very good substitute for meat. A small slice of pork and many slices of apple flied together who does not remember the good qualities of such dish What mode of cooking ev r equaled roasting an apple by wood fire, oxygen on the other What food was ever richer or better than sweet baked apples and milk
 o, blessed fruit, in tarts, pies, jellies, pre- serves, buildings or dumplings-and what vis ions of strings of dried apples adorning the old rafters of the farmhouse! For stock, what better or cheaper food ? Although cider has been banished, in measure, from the table as
 
 It does not come to the table as formerly. in the pitcher or quart mug: it comes in bottles and is called champagne. Its use, however, in it's original form, is gradually creeping back; and although a temperance man, I cannot ex- pect you to make cider, yet do expect you, if you will make it, to make it good but never make it into cider brandy that is bad in all it's aspects, unless we may except the charge of the Rebels against Ealley. that it was ci- der brandy that caused his defeat in the She- nandoah Valley.
 In conclusion, Mir. Beecher exhorted every body to plant orchards, to plant apple trees iu waste spots, to plant theln by the roadside, to make the fruit so plenty that none but most inveterate ttief would thinE; of stealing it : to plant orchards, and thus lift up the common people. Enable them 10 live better. and you improve them.
 To prove the antiquity of the apple tree, Mir Beecher Tlotel from the song of Solomon :-- |" l sat down under his shadow Tan apple tree1 with gre%t delight, and his fruit was sweet to my taste He brought me to tue bauquetiny house, and bis banner over me was love. Stay me with. hagoas [of cider. comfort me with apples, for l am sick of love-
 Mir. Beecher thought if the apple tree was a cure for love, he-also supposed it vas thought to be Cure for ambition, for he had frequently heard the boys singing,
 "We'll hang Jeff, Davis on a sour apple tree"
 It was now thought to be fitting timo to treat the company, with a patriotic song, and the |" Star-Spangled Banner' was given by a lady with most thrilling effect.
 Then Horace Greeley gave short discourse upon forest trees which liveted the attention and interested the mind of every one present during it's delivery. He alluded to the years of his boyhood which he had spent in the des- truc,ion of trees. every day then, and every day since, growing more and more in love with them. The ambition of most Americans seems to be to destroy, his delight is to preserve, them. The glory of an American landscape which Europeans most admire is our noble for ests, unequaled in any other country.
 There seems to be an impression that if the earth is let alone it produces trees, and many act as though they thought this continent was covered with them, yet seven-eights of it is na- ked They only grow upon a little strip along the Atlantic. Between the timbered region and the Pacific there is great treelees desert. Being treeless it IS wateress The rivers, ex- cept in flood times, are dry beds of sand and gravel. have travelled there fifty miles with out finding water. There. trees are looked up- on as great blessing. Here, they are so abundant we do not value them. We do not know how to value the excellent quality of our timber, which is nowhere else eaualeI Be yond-the Missouri there is scarcely tree fit for an ax helve or an axle. The trees have no value except for fuel and for that, if here we should consider them almost worthless. Trees are the beauty and glory of the earth. yet people hack and destroy them as though it was glorious employment to rid the earth of their presence. One of the blessings and com forts of a farmers life is wood fire it makes the cheerfulness of the Winter evening. It IS declared by some of the lovers of wood fires that the oecline in . ational patriotism is owing to the introduction of wood stoves. How often men have been invoked to defend their hearth stones and fresides but who ever heard of an invocation to defend a cooking stove? Every farmer who has it not, should resolve to grow fuel. Many might obtain all they require by judicious pruning.
 He spoke enthusiastically of that portion oI his farm tor rather, "my wife's'1 which was covered with original forest trees. That DOT ton of it never runs me in debt By destroy ! ing forests, we have dried up our Summer streams and produced destructive floods r l Winter
 The woodland retains the rainfall, and make: the streams more durable and useful The