anned tomatoes over pretty carefully, and if I saw that one
lady had not only put them up so that they hadn't turned foamy, but had
also succeeded with green corn, and that other poser, string beans,
I'd give her first premium, because I'd know she was a first-rate
housekeeper, and a careful woman, and one that deserved encouragement.

But I'd save myself for the pies. I can tell a rich, short, flaky crust,
and I can tell the kind that is as brown as a dried apple, and tough as
the same on the top, and sad and livery on the bottom. And I know about
fillings, how thick they ought to be, and how they ought to be seasoned,
and all. Particularly pumpkin-pies, because I had early advantages that
way that very few other boys had. I was allowed to scrape the crock that
had held the pumpkin for the pies. So that's how I know as much as I do.

I suppose, however, when all is said and done, that there is no pie that
can quite come up to an apple-pie. You take nice, short crust that's
been worked up with ice-water, and line the tin with it, and fill it
heaping with sliced, tart apples--not sauce. 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