The Baltimore County union. [volume] (Towsontown, Md.) 1865-1909, 1909-08-21
THE BOY AND THE APPLE ORCHARD

Now is the season of the year whef
the small boy gives concern and an
noyance to horticulturist, because The
early apple has arrived and soon the
fall green ones will prove a tempta
ton to the youthful mind and stom
ach.
First, we must admit that the boy
has some excuse for his propensity tc
steal, and especially apples. His re
mote ancestors were thieves and rob-
bers, and so the primeval instinct re-
mains as an inheritance in the boy,
Next, he will steal apples to annoy a
neighbor he does not like. Finally,
he steals apples for the sake of ad-
venture-the delight of outwitting
watchful eyes and making a hair.
breadth escape is detected in the act
of pillage.
Then, too, a boy and green apples
are compliments. It almost seems a
normal boy is more likely to die from
having no green apples to eat than
from their actual consumption. A
boy apparently can thrive on any
thing green from an apple to goose
berry, and so If he cannot get the
food he longs for at home he will steal
1t from the next yard.
All this we say by way Of excuse
for the boy. Most Of us were one of
him several years ago. and we must
not measure his corn or green apples
In our old rickety half bushel.
Still we must say that this forag.
ing for green fruit on the part Of a
boy is annoying to the orchardist who
suffers. He plants, trims, sprays and
prays for fruit, an when it is in prom
ise there comes along a pilfering boy,
and in his looting leaves nothing but
the tree behind.
Not long ago an editorial friend of
New England, on the Hartford COur-
ant, who combine the welding of the
pen with the labor of the pruning
hook, had his fruit preserve invaded
and one of his finest trees denuded
ofits "promise and potency" of many
apples. He thus tells the story and
suggests remedy:
Two small boys were caught in the
act of robbing an apple orchard, which
has for some time been regularly
plundered by such marauders. The
boys were taken into court and an ef-
fort was made to have the owner of
the orchard appear in the light of a
prosecutor. The fool question was
asked whether green apples had any
market value. OF course, they do
not. But how are you going to get
ripe apples except first you have the
green ones? Knock those worthless
things off the tree and there will be
nothing left to ripen. People seem
to forget that life Is short and 1t takes
fruit tree an entire year to produce
its fruit. Rob II in half hour in
1900 and you will not get any apples
from it until 1910. A year is long
time to be set back by gang of boys
whose only object Is to steal and who
would cry if presented with the fruit
and compelled to eat it. Their sole
fun lies in the excitement of the
chase and the consciousness that they
are stealing. It is weak and demor-
alizing to let such little rascals off,
and worse yet to try to make them
appear to be victims of the meanress
and narrowness of their elders.
What they need is a sound thrashing
and something to develop in them
the consciousness that stealing is not
only wrong, but mighty unsafe. Peo-
pie who have no fruit except what
they buy or what their children con-
veniently bring home have no sense
of the feeling ofIthe fruit grower to-
wards the crop he raises. He watch
es it grow daily and cares for 1t with
something of the solicitude and hope
fulness of parent. 1t approaches
ripeness and his interest intensi6es,
and then all of sudden, just too
soon to be of use to anybody, it is car
ried off by thieves and the labors and
hopes of whole season are dashed.
The boys who, in their cheap and
injurious love of law-breaking, can
make all this trouble need no sympa-
thy. Theyneed something altogether
more material and tangible than that.
We could not have it in our heart
to be quite so harsh, and yet If we
owned an editorial orchard we should
not like the apples of our care disap-
pear In toto.
We suggest, therefore, that the new
education inspire the boy with a
sense of equity that he should just
steal enough apples to satisfy his hun
ger for green fruit, crafty his love of
excitement and adventure, and leave
the major part to the owner.
A boy should be taught not to act
the part of a weasel which kills for
the mere love of blood and slaughter,
and not merely to satisfy appetite.
We have always advocated the
policy of the middle way and the
averaging of things. Too much fog
ging and Jail would make boy worse.
So It would be better for the owner
of an orchard to compromise with the
lads-the first to furnish the neces-
sary green apples for the normal mr.
chin, with the proviso that the latter
only steal moderate portion.
Thus will sweetness of temper be