it carefully. It was the finest apple I ever set a tooth in. It
was the juiciest and the spiciest apple. It had sort of a rollicking
flavor to it, if you know what I mean. It certainly was the ne plus
ultra of an apple. And the name of it was the rambo. Dear me, how
good it was! think I'd sooner have one right now than great riches.
And all these apples they kept in the apple-hole. You went out and
uncovered the earth and there they were, all in a big nest of straw;
and such a gush of perfume distilled from that pile of them that
just to recollect it makes my mouth all wet.

They had a big red apple in those days that I forget the name of.
Oh, it was a whopper! You'd nibble at it and nibble at it before
you could get a purchase on it. Then, after you got your teeth in,
you'd pull and pull, and all of a sudden the apple would go "tock!"
and your head would fly back from the recoil, and you had a bite
about the size of your hand. You "chomped" on it, with your cheek
all bulged out, and blame near drowned yourself with the juice of it.

Noon-time the girls used to count the seeds:

"One I love, two I love, three my love I see;
Four I love with all my heart, and five I cast away.
Six he loves; seven she loves; eight . . . eight . . . "

I forget what eight is, and all that follows after. And then the
others would tease her with, "Aw, Jennie!" knowing who it was she
had named the apple for, Wes. Rinehart, or 'Lonzo Curl, or whoever.
And you'd be standing there by the stove, kind of grinning and not
thinking of anything in particular when somebody would hit you a
clout on your back that just about broke you in two, and would tell