Stick the peg in the apple and you have a
very fair representation of a candle. The wick you can light, and it
will burn for at least a minute. In performing you should have your
candle in a clean candlestick, show it plainly to the audience, and then
put it into your mouth, taking care to blow it out, and munch it up. If
you think best, you can blow the candle out and allow the wick to cool,
and it will look, with its burned wick, so natural that even the
sharpest eyes can not distinguish it from the genuine article.
Once, at a summer resort in Massachusetts, I made use of this candle
with considerable effect. While performing a few parlor tricks to amuse
some friends, I pretended to need a light. A confederate left the room,
and soon returned with a lantern containing one of these apple
counterfeits.
"Do you call that a candle?" I said.
"Certainly," he replied.
"Why, there is scarcely a mouthful."
"A mouthful? Rather a disagreeable mouthful, I guess."
"You have never been in Russia, I presume."
"Never."
"Then you don't know what is good."
"Good?"
"Yes, good. Why, candle ends, with the wick a little burned to give them
a flavor, are delicious.
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