In the South, it were a crime not to eat this fruit, created for the immortals, just as God made it. Sugar could be added but to its dishonour; the pots and pans of the sacrilegious cook would be desecration unspeakable. Feast then, upon its natural charms, and as the hot Southern breeze brings to you the scent of strange Southern blossoms, and the sky stretches blindingly blue above, and _One_ sits at your side feasting in silent sympathy, fancy yourself, if you will, the new Adam--or Eve--for whom the flaming swords have been lowered, and the long-closed gates of the Garden of Eden thrown wide open.
But in the North, banish romance, banish imagination; bring to the study of the orange the prose of necessity, and realism of the earnest student. And sometimes, from prose--who knows?--poetry may spring; from realism will be evolved wild dreaming.
If the orange be from Jaffa, or "hail" from Florida, and care bestowed upon it during its long voyaging, then will it need no Northern artifice to enhance the pleasure in its power to give. True that something--much, indeed--it will have lost; but something of its Southern, spicy, subtle sweetness still survives--of the Orient's glamour, of the mystery of the Western wilderness of flower and fruit. Eat it, therefore, as it is, unadorned, unspoiled. Tear away tenderly the covering that cleaves to it so closely; tear the fruit apart with intelligent fingers; to cut it is to sacrifice its cooling juice to inanimate china, and to deprive yourself of the first freshness of its charms.
When, however, as generally--to our sorrow, be it said--the orange arrives a parody of itself, it were better to join it to one of its several dearest affinities. In well-selected company, it may recover the shadow, and more, of the splendour it elsewhere enjoys in solitary state. Thus disguised, it may wander from dessert to the course of sweets, and by so wandering save the resourceless from the monotony of rice and rizine, batter and bread-and-butter puddings, whose fitting realm is the nursery, and from an eternity of tarts which do not, like a good design, gain by repetition. In cocoanut, the orange recognises a fellow exile, and the two, coming together, yield a new flavour, a new delight. For this purpose, the orange must be cut that the juice may flow, and if in symmetrical rounds, the effect will be more satisfying to the critical. Let the slices be laid at once in the bowl destined to hold them at the moment of serving, that not a drop of juice may escape, and arrange them so that over every layer of orange reposes a layer of sugar. Then taking the cocoanut that has been well drained, grate it as fine as patience will allow; under it bury the orange until the gold is all concealed, and the dish looks white and light and soft as the driven snow. No harm will be done, but, on the contrary, much good, by preparing some hours before dinner. It is a pretty conceit; half unwillingly the spoon disturbs this summery snow-field. But well that it does, for the combination pleases the palate no less than the eye. The orange summons forth the most excellent qualities of the cocoanut; the cocoanut suppresses the acidity and crudeness of the expatriated orange.