Mercy,
no! - and sweeten them just right, and put on a lump of butter, and
some allspice, and perhaps a clove, and a little lemon peel, and
then put on the cover, and trim off the edge, and pinch it up in
scallops, and draw a couple of leaves in the top with a sharp knife,
and have the oven just right, and set it in there, and I tell you
that when ma opens the oven-door to see how the pie is coming on,
there distils through the house such a perfume that you cry out in
a choking voice: "Say! Ain't dinner 'most ready?"
But I fully recognize the fact that very often our judgment is
warped by feeling, and I am inclined to believe that even the
undoubted merit of the apple-pie would not prevail against a
vinegar-pie, if such should be presented to me for my decision.
A vinegar-pie? Well, it has a top and bottom crust, the same as
any other pie, but its filling is made of vinegar, diluted with
water to the proper degree of sub-acidity, sweetened with molasses,
thickened with flour, and all baked as any other pie. You smile at
its crude simplicity, and wonder why I should favor it. To you it
doesn't tell the story that it does to me. It doesn't take you
back in imagination to "the airly days," when folks came over the
mountains in covered wagons, and settled in the Western Reserve,
leaving behind them all the civilization of their day, and its
comforts, parting from relatives and friends, knowing full well that
in this life they never more should look upon their faces - leaving
everything behind to make a new home in the western wilds.
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