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daughter runs away with the king’s son, she cuts an Apple into
a mystical number of small bits, and each bit talks. When she
kills the giant, she puts an Apple under the hoof of the magic filly,
and he dies, for his life is the Apple, and it is crushed. When the
byre is cleansed, it is so clean, that a golden Apple would run from
end to end and never raise a stain. There is a Gruagach who
has a golden Apple, which is thrown at all comers, who, if they
fail to catch it, die. When it is caught and thrown back by the
hero, Gruagach an Ubhail, dies. There is a certain game called
cluich an ubhail—the Apple play—which seems to have been a
deadly game. When the king’s daughter transports the soldier to
the green island on the magic table-cloth, he finds magic Apples
which transform him, and others which cure him, and by which he
transforms the cruel princess, and recovers his magic treasures.
When the two eldest idle king’s sons go out to herd the giant’s
cattle, they find an Apple-tree whose fruit moves up and down as
they vainly strive to pluck it ; in fact, in all Gaelic stories, the
Apple when introduced has something marvellous about it.
So, in the German, in the ‘ Man of Iron,’ a princess throws a
golden Apple as a prize, which the hero catches three times, and
carries off, and wins. In ‘ Snow White,’ where the poisoned comb
occurs, there is a poisoned magic Apple also. In the ‘ Old Griffin,’
the rich princess is cured by rosy-cheeked Apples. In the ‘ White
Snake,’ a servant who understands the voice of birds, helps
creatures in distress, gets them aid, and procures golden Apples
from three ravens which fiy over the sea to the end of the world,
where stands the tree of life. When he had got the Apple, he and
the princess eat it and marry. Again, in the ‘Wonderful Hares,’ a
golden Apple is the gift for which the finder is to gain a princess;
and that Apple grew on a tree, the sole one of its kind.
In Norse it is the same: the princess on the glass mountain
held three golden Apples in her lap, and he who could ride up the
hill and carry off the Apples was to win the prize; and the princess
rolled them down to the hero, and they rolled into his shoe. The
good girl plucked the Apples from the tree which spoke to her
when she went down the well to the underground world; but the
ill-tempered step-sister thrashed down the fruit; and when the
time of trial came, the Apple-tree played its part and protedled the
poor girl.
In a French tale, a singing Apple is one of the marvels which
Princess Belle Etoile and her brothers and her cousin bring from
the end of the world. In an Italian story, a lady when she has lost
her husband goes off to the Atlantic Ocean with three golden Apples;
and the mermaid who has swallowed the husband shows first his
head, then his body to the waist, and then to the knees, each time
for a golden Apple. Then, finally, in the ‘ Arabian Nights,’ there
is a long story, called the Three Apples, which turns upon the theft
of one, which was considered to have been of priceless value.
p f a n t Isioi*©, T^egellb/, a n il Tsqric/. 225
The Apple-blossom is considered to be an emblem of preference.
To dream of Apples betokens long life, success in trade, and a
lover’s faithfulness.
A P P L E O F SO DOM .—The Solanum Sodomeum is a purple
Egg-plant of which the fruit is naturally large and handsome. It
is, however, subjecit to the attacks of an insedt (a species of Cynips),
which pundtures the rind, and converts the interior of the fruit into
a substance like ashes, while the outside remains fair and beautiful.
It is found on the desolate shores of the Dead Sea, on the site of
those cities of the plain the dreadful judgment on which is recorded
in sacred history. Hence the fruit, called the Apple of Sodom,
has acquired a sinister reputation, and is regarded as the symbol
of sin. Its first appearance, it is said, is always attended with a
bitter north-east wind, and therefore ships for the Black Sea take care
to sail before the harbinger of bad weather comes forth. The fruit
is reputed to be poisonous. Josephus, the Jewish historian, speaks
of them as having “ a fair colour, as if they were fit to be eaten;
but if you pluck them with your hand, they vanish into smoke and
ashes.” Milton, describing an Apple which added new torments
to the fallen angels, compares it to the Apples of Sodom:—
“ Greedily they pluck’d
The fruitage fair to sight, like that which grew
Near that bituminous lake where Sodom flamed.
This mere delusion, not the touch but taste
Deceived ; they fondly thinking to allay
Their appetite with gust, instead of fruit
Chewed bitter ashes,”
Henry Teonge, who visited the country round the Dead Sea in
1675, describes it as being “ all over full of stones which looke just
like burnt syndurs, and on some low shrubbs there grow small
round things which are called Apples, but no witt like them. They
are somewhat fayre to looke at, but touch them and they smoulder
all to black ashes, like soote both for looks and smell.” The name
Apple of Sodom is also given to a kind of Gall-nut, which is found
growing on various species of dwarf Oaks on the banks of the
Jordan. Dead Sea Apples is a term applied to the Bussorah
Gall-nut, which is formed on the Oak Quercus infectoria by an inseit,
and being of a bright ruddy purple, but filled with a gritty powder,
they are suggestive of the deceptive Apple of Sodom.
“ Dead Sea fruits, that tempt the eye,
But turn to ashes on the lips.”
A p p l e o f P a r a d i s e , or A d am ’ s A p p l e .— See Banana.
A p p l e , L o v e .— See Solanum.
A p p l e , M a d .— See Solanum.
A P R IC O T .—According to Columella, the Persians sent the
Peach to Egypt to poison the inhabitants; and a species of Apricot
is called by the people of Barbary, Matza Franca, or the “ Killer of
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