"It's been a long time, Jim," admitted Harding. "How old is this?"
"I've put in a cask every year since I took the place," he replied, "and that's more'n thirty years ago, and not a cask here but has cider in it."
"Cider thirty years old!" exclaimed Chilvers. "You mean vinegar, don't you?"
"I said cider, young man; an' when I say cider I mean cider," retorted Bishop, rather indignantly. "It is no more vinegar than brandy's vinegar, nor champagne's vinegar. Now, I don't reckon none of you, barring my old friend John Harding, here, ever tasted a drop of real hard cider. Oh, yes, Smith has, of course; but how about the rest of ye?"
Carter, LaHume, Marshall, and Chilvers admitted that their idea of hard cider was a beverage which had started to ferment.
Bishop placed his hand reverently on a blackened, time-charred cask. It was evident he was as proud of that possession as others might be of an authenticated Raphael.
"I don't tap this here very often," he said, "but in honour of this occasion I'll let it run a bit. This here cider is fifty years old!"
He drew off a pint or so in a stone jug, and we went out into the light to examine it. It was almost colourless, slightly amber in shade, if any tint can describe it. I had seen that sacred cask when a boy, and I recall now that Joe Bishop did not dare touch it, and there were few things of which he was afraid.
We all solemnly sampled it from small glasses, which Bishop produced from some mysterious hiding place.
"There is no taste to it," declared Chilvers. "It's smooth as oil, but it has no flavour."