Part 39

Female pimpernell (Gerard, em., p. 617),—Anagallis arvensis, γ, Sm.; A. cærulea, Schreb.,—but scarcely differing, except in color, from the scarlet pimpernel, which has long (“in clayey ground,”—Cutler, l. c., 1785) been an inhabitant of the coasts of Massachusetts Bay, though doubtless introduced.

Hepatica triloba, Chaix. (Anemone hepatica, L.), common to Europe and America; occurring occasionally with white flowers.—Gerard, em., p. 1203.

Rubus, L. The red raspberry of this country is hardly other than an American variety of the European (R. Idæus, var. strigosus, caule petiolis pedunculis calyceque aculeato-hispidissimis, Enum. Pl. Agri Cantab, 1843, Ms.); upon which see Gray (Man., p. 121; and Statistics, &c., l. c., p. 81). R. triflorus, Richards., is also very near to, and was once considered the same as, the European R. saxatilis, L. The rest of our New-England raspberries and blackberries appear to be specifically distinct from those of Europe. The cloud-berry, mentioned at p. 60, is there set down among plants proper to the country; and may therefore not be the true cloud-berry (Gerard, p. 1273), or Rubus chamæmorus, L., which is common to both continents.

The New-England gooseberries are peculiar to this country. The author no doubt intends Ribes hirtellum, Michx. (Gray, Man., p. 137); as see further his Voyages, p. 72.

Cratægus, L. But the species are peculiar to this country, as Josselyn implies with respect to the haws which he notices. These, no doubt, included C. tomentosa, L., Gray; and perhaps, also, C. coccinea, L. Wood says, “The white thorn affords hawes as big as an English cherry; which is esteemed above a cherry for his goodness and pleasantness to the taste.”—New-England’s Prospect, chap. v. At page 72 of his Voyages, the author mentions “a small shrub, which is very common; growing sometimes to the height of elder; bearing a berry like in shape to the fruit of the white thorn; of a pale, yellow colour at first, then red (when it is ripe, of a deep purple); of a delicate, aromatical tast, but somewhat stiptick,”—which may be Pyrus arbutifolia, L. Higginson (New-England’s Plantation, l. c., p. 119) speaks of our haws almost as highly as Wood.

Great toad-flax (Gerard, em., p. 550); Linaria vulgaris, Moench. Compare De Candolle (Geog. Bot., vol. ii. p. 716) for a sketch of the American history of this now familiar plant, which the learned author cannot trace before Bigelow’s date (Fl. Bost., edit. 1) of 1814. But it is certainly Cutler’s “snapdragon; ... blossoms yellow, with a mixture of scarlet; common by roadsides in Lynn and Cambridge” (l. c., 1785): though he strangely prefixes the Linnæan phrase for Antirrhinum Canadense, L.; and there seems no reason to doubt that Josselyn may very well have seen it in 1671.

Gerard, p. 653 (Teucrium, L.). The author may have intended to reckon the genus only. Our species is peculiar to this continent.

The designation is uncertain. The old botanists gave the name Auricula muris, or mouse-ear, to species of Myosotis, Draba, Hieracium, and Gnaphalium. Josselyn’s plant may most probably be Antennaria plantaginifolia, Hook. (mouse-ear of New England), which is very near to A. dioica of Europe.—Gray, Statistics, &c., l. c., p. 81.

Quercus alba, L.; Q. rubra, L.; and Q. tinctoria, Bartr. Wood’s account of the oaks (New-England’s Prospect, chap. v.) is similar. In his Voyages, p. 61, Josselyn gives us “the ordering of red oake for wainscot. When they have cut it down and clear’d it from the branches, they pitch the body of the tree in a muddy place in a river, with the head downward, for some time. Afterwards they draw it out; and, when it is seasoned sufficiently, they saw it into boards for wainscot; and it will branch out into curious works.”

Juniperus communis, L.; common to both continents. But the author did not probably distinguish from it J. Virginiana, L.; which is frequent, and often dwarfish, near the sea.

Salix, L.; the genus only meant here, it is likely.

Daphne Laureola, L. (Gerard, p. 1404), with which Josselyn may have considered Kalmia angustifolia, L., in some sort allied. The latter has long been known in New England as dwarf or low laurel.

Myrica Gale, L. (Gerard, p. 1414); common to Europe and America.

Sambucus, L. Our S. Canadensis, L. differs very little from the common elder of Europe, except, as our author in his Voyages says (p. 71), in being “shrubbie,” and in not having “a smell so strong.”—Cf. DC. Prodr., vol. ii. p. 322; Gerard, p. 1421. The other North-American elder (S. pubens, Michx.) is at least equally near to the European S. racemosa, L., according to Prof. Gray.

“There is a sort of dwarf-elder, that grows by the sea-side, that hath a red pith. The berries of both”—that is, of this and of the true elder mentioned above—“are smaller than English elder; not round, but corner’d.”—Voyages, p. 71. Gerard’s dwarf-elder (p. 1425) is Sambucus ebulus, L. Josselyn’s may have been a Viburnum; for this genus was confused with Sambucus by the elder botanists. Wood (New-England Prospect, chap. v.) speaks of—

“Small eldern, by the Indian fletchers sought;”—

which was perhaps arrow-wood, or Viburnum dentatum, L.

Alnus, Tourn. One of the three New-England species (A. incana, Willd.) is common to Europe and America. Another (A. serrulata, Willd.) “bears so great a resemblance,” says F. A. Michaux, to the common European alder (A. glutinosa, Willd.) “in its flowers, its seeds, its leaves, its wood, and its bark, as to render a separate figure unnecessary; the only difference observable between them” being “that the European species is larger, and has smaller leaves.”—Sylva, vol. ii. p. 114. Compare Gray, Statistics, &c., l. c., p. 83. A. viridis, our third species, is common to Europe and this country.

Corylus, L. Our species, which are peculiar to America, are both indicated: the “filberd, ... with hairy husks upon the nuts,” being C. rostrata, Ait. (beaked hazel); and that “setting hollow from the nut,”—that is, larger than the nut.—C. Americana, Wangenh. (common hazel).

Carya, Nutt. In the Voyages, p. 69, the author speaks of the “walnut, which is divers: some bearing square nuts; others like ours, but smaller. There is likewise black walnut, of precious use for tables, cabinets, and the like” (Juglans nigra, L.). “The walnut-tree,” continues Josselyn, “is the toughest wood in the countrie, and therefore made use of for hoops and bowes; there being no yews there growing. In England, they made their bowes usually of witch-hasel” (that is, witch-elm,—Ulmus montana, Bauh., Lindl.; as see Gerard, p. 1481: but Carpinus, “in Essex, is called witch-hasell,”—ib.), “ash, yew, the best of outlandish elm; but the Indians make theirs of walnut.” This was hickory, and what Wood says belongs doubtless to the same. He calls it “something different from the English walnut; being a great deal more tough and more serviceable, and altogether heavy. And whereas our guns, that are stocked with English walnut, are soon broken and cracked in frost,—being a brittle wood,—we are driven to stock them new with the country walnut, which will endure all blows and weather; lasting time out of mind.” After speaking favorably of the fruit, he adds (New-Eng. Prospect, chap. vi.), “There is likewise a tree, in some parts of the country, that bears a nut as big as a pear,”—the butternut, doubtless (Juglans cinerea, L.). Josselyn has told us (p. 48) of the oil which the Indians managed to get from the acorns of the white oak. Roger Williams (Key, l. c., p. 220) says our native Americans made “of these walnuts ... an excellent oil, good for many uses, but especially for the anointing of their heads.” Michaux (Sylva, vol. i. p. 163) says the Indians used the oil of the butternut, and also (p. 185) of the shag-bark, “to season their aliments.” Williams adds (l. c.), “Of the chips of the walnut-tree—the bark taken off—some English in the country make excellent beer, both for taste, strength, colour, and inoffensive opening operation.”

Castanea vesca, Gaertn.; common to Europe and America. Our chestnut is considered to differ from the European only as an American variety of a species common to both continents might be expected to. “The Indians have an art of drying their chestnuts, and so to preserve them in their barns for a dainty all the year.”—R. Williams, l. c.

Neither Wood nor R. Williams makes mention of it. The younger Michaux considered our beech distinct from the European; but Mr. Nuttall makes it only a variety of it; while Prof. Gray puts both trees in his list of “very close representative species.”—Statistics, &c., l. c., p. 81.

Fraxinus, L. Our species are peculiar to this continent. I cannot account for Wood’s saying, “It is different from the ash of England; being brittle and good for little, so that walnut is used for it.”—New-Eng. Prospect, chap. vi.

Sorbus, L. (Gerard, p. 1473). Our mountain-ash (S. Americana, Willd.) is quite near to the quicken, or mountain-ash of the north of Europe (S. aucuparia, L.); but hardly, perhaps, to be reduced to an American variety of it, as the elder Michaux (Fl. Amer., vol. i. p. 290) proposed. Compare Gray, Statistics, &c., l. c., p. 82.

Except the small white birch (B. populifolia, Ait.), which Mr. Spach reduces to a variety of the European B. alba, L.,—in which he is sustained by Prof. Gray (Man., p. 411),—and the dwarf-birch (B. nana, L.) of our alpine regions, all our species are peculiar to this continent.—See the author’s Voyages, p. 69, for another mention of the birches.

Populus, L. Our species are peculiar to the country, as the author’s remark suggests. Wood (l. c.) notices “the ever-trembling asps.”

“The plumbs of the country be better for plumbs than the cherries be for cherries. They be black and yellow; about the bigness of damsons; of a reasonable good taste.”—New-Eng. Prospect, chap. v. Prunus maritima, Wangenh. (beech-plum), and P. Americana, Marsh. (wild yellow plum), are no doubt here intended; as also, it is likely, by Josselyn, who, it is evident, in this place had only the genus in mind as “common with us in England.”—See p. 61 for the author’s mention of the “wild cherry.”

Portulaca oleracea, L. (Gerard, p. 521). “In cornfields. It is eaten as a pot-herb, and esteemed by some as little inferior to asparagus.”—Cutler; Account of Indigenous Vegetables (1785), l. c., p. 447. Considered to have been introduced here; but our author enables us to carry back the date of its introduction, without reasonable doubt, to the first settlement of the country. “Purslain, Mr. Glover says, is also very common in Virginia, and troublesome too, to the tobacco-planters.” Sir Philip Skippon to Ray, Feb. 11, 1675-6, in Ray Society’s Corresp. of John Ray, p. 121. Mr. Nuttall regarded the species as indigenous on the plains of the Missouri; but this plant, “too closely resembling the common purslane,” according to Prof. Gray (Man., p. 64), has been separated as specifically distinct by Dr. Engelmann.