Toffee Apples

Food in England, Dorothy Hartley, p. 421

'Before the general importation of plantation sugar - they would be quite expensive. Probably small windfall apples dipped in a toffee of honey and beeswax bedabbled fairs of St. Bartholomew even before sugar, as we know it, came into general use.'

(how many) small apples
quarter lb butter
half lb treacle (molasses? what kind?)
1 lb brown sugar
1 Tbsp vinegar (apple cider?white?)

1. Wash the apples and dry thoroughly. Poke in the stick.
2. Melt the butter in a deep pot and then add the rest of the ingredients.
3. Bring to a boil and keep on a roiling boil for 20 minutes (what candy thermometre temp?).
4. Quickly dip the apples, (probably doing a rotation of apples to dip, allow to cool and dip again to develop a good crust).