Part 42

Gerard, p. 276,—Capsella Bursa Pastoris (L.), Moench. “Cornfields, and about barns,”—Cutler (1785), l. c. Naturalized.

Gerard, p. 290,—Taraxacum Dens Leonis, Desf.; looked, to our author, like a new-comer. Dr. Gray (Man., p. 239; and comp. Torr, and Gray, Fl., vol. ii. p. 494) regards it as “probably indigenous in the north,” but only naturalized in other regions. “Grass land,”—Cutler (1785), l. c.

Gerard, p. 278,—Senecio vulgaris, L.; one of the adventive naturalized plants, as defined by Mr. De Candolle (l. c., vol. ii. p. 688; and Gray, Man. Bot., pref., p. viii.), according to the evidence of Dr. Darlington (Fl. Cestr., p. 152), and Gray, l. c. It has long been a common weed in eastern New England.

Sonchus, L. S. oleraceus, L., as understood by Linnæus, was no doubt intended: but this is now taken to include two species, both recognized in this country (Gray, l. c., p. 241); between which there is no evidence to authorize a decision.

The genera Chenopodium, L., and Atriplex, L., were much confused in Josselyn’s day; and his wild orach may belong to either. Gerard’s wild orach is in part Atriplex patula, L. (p. 326); but the first species to which he gives this name (p. 325) is Chenopodium polyspermum, L. The latter is a rare, adventive member of our Flora (Gray, l. c., p. 363); and the former is, according to Bigelow (Fl. Bost., ed. 3, p. 401), the well-known orach of our salt-marshes: but Dr. Gray now refers this (Man., p. 365) to the nearly allied A. hastata, L. This plant, in either case, is reckoned truly common to both continents. It is possible that Josselyn intended it.

Garden nightshade (Gerard, p. 339); Solanum nigrum, L. “Common among rubbish,”—Cutler (1785), l. c. Naturalized.

Common stinging-nettle, or great nettle (Gerard, p. 706),—Urtica dioica, L.

Field-mallow (Gerard, p. 930), Malva sylvestris, L., and wild dwarf-mallow (ibid.), M. rotundifolia, L., are the only sorts likely to have been in view. The latter was, I doubt not, intended; and the former, adventive only with us, may also have occurred at any period after the settlement.

“It is but one sort, and that is broad-leaved plantain” (Josselyn’s Voyages, p. 188). Broad-leaved plantain (Gerard, p. 419),—Plantago major, L.; one of the most anciently and widely known of plants, and inhabiting, at present, all the great divisions of the earth. An account, similar to our author’s, of the name given to it by the American savages, is found in Kalm’s Travels. “Mr. Bartram had found this plant in many places on his travels; but he did not know whether it was an original American plant, or whether the Europeans had brought it over. This doubt had its rise from the savages (who always had an extensive knowledge of the plants of the country) pretending that this plant never grew here before the arrival of the Europeans. They therefore gave it a name which signifies the Englishman’s foot; for they say, that, where a European had walked, there this plant grew in his footsteps.”—Kalm’s Travels into North America, by Forster, vol. i. p. 92. But Dr. Pickering considers it possible, that, in North-west America at least, the plantain was introduced by the aborigines (Races of Man, pp. 317, 320): and, uncertain as this is admitted to be, the old vulgar names of the plant in Northern languages—as Wegerich and Wegetritt of the German, Weegblad and Weegbree of the Dutch, Veibred of the Danish, and Weybred of old English, all pointing to the plantain’s growing on ways trodden by man—suggest, perhaps, a far older supposed relation between this plant and the human foot than that mentioned above; and thus favor the derivation of the original Latin name (as old as Pliny, H. N., vol. xxv. 8, in § 39) from planta, the sole of the foot,—whether because the plantain is always trodden on, or, taking the termination go in plantago, as some philologists take it, to signify likeness (as doubtless in lappago, mollugo, asperugo; but this signification does not appear so clear in some other words with the like ending), because its leaves resemble the sole of the foot in flatness, breadth, marking, and so on. The possible derivation from planta, a plant, “per excellentiam, quasi plantam præstantissimam” (Tournef., Inst., vol. i. p. 128), though less open to question than that of Linnæus (“planta tangenda,” Phil. Bot., § 234), is certainly less significant than the other; which, with the statements (independent, so far as appears, of each other) of Josselyn and Kalm, if these may be relied on, seems to point to a very ancient co-incidence of thought, not unworthy of attention. Something else of the same sort is to be found in R. Williams, where he says (Key, l. c., p. 218) that the Massachusetts Indians called the constellation of the Great Bear mosk, or pawkunnawaw; that is, the bear.

Gerard, p. 353,—Hyoscyamus niger, L. Adventive only: having “escaped from gardens to roadsides,” according to Dr. Gray (Man., p. 340); but “common amongst rubbish and by roadsides,” in 1785 (Cutler, l. c.), and perhaps long known on the coasts of Massachusetts Bay.

Broad-leaved wormwood, “our common and best-knowne wormwood” (Gerard, p. 1096),—Artemisia absynthium, L. “Roadsides and amongst rubbish,” 1785,—Cutler, l. c. Omitted by Bigelow, and not very frequent.

Gerard, p. 388. If this is to be taken for Rumex acutus, Sm. (Fl. Brit.), which seems not to be certain, it is now referable to R. conglomeratus, Murr., which is “sparingly introduced” with us, according to Gray (Man., p. 377). But it is more likely that Josselyn had R. crispus, L. (curled dock), in view: which is, I suppose, the “varietie” of sharp-pointed dock, “with crisped or curled leaves,” of Johnson’s Gerard, p. 387; and is the only mention of the species by those authors.

Gerard, p. 389,—Rumex Patientia, L. This and the next were garden pot-herbs of repute: and, at p. 90, our author brings them in again as such; telling us that bloodwort grows “but sorrily,” but patience “very pleasantly.” This may very likely have crept out of some garden: but the great water-dock (R. Hydrolapathum, Huds.) is, says Gerard, “not unlike to the garden patience” (p. 390); and Dr. Gray says the same of the American variety of the former.—Man., p. 377.

Gerard, p. 390,—Rumex sanguineus, L., “sown for a pot-herb in most gardens” (Gerard); and so our author, p. 90. Linnæus took it to be originally American: but it is common in Europe; and Dr. Gray marks the American plant as naturalized. Dr. Torrey indicated the species as occurring about New York in 1819 (Catal. Pl., N.Y.); but New-England botanists do not appear to have recognized it. Josselyn’s plant was perhaps the offcast of some garden.

Gerard, p. 404.—Compare p. 42 of this; where our author more correctly reckons it among plants truly common to Europe and America.

“Common knot-grasse” (Gerard, p. 565),—Polygonum aviculare, L. Common to all the great divisions of the earth, and reckoned indigenous in America.—De Cand. Geogr. Bot., vol. i. p. 577; Gray, Man., p. 373.

There are many chickweeds in Gerard; but that most likely to have been in the author’s view here is the universally known common chickweed,—the middle or small chickweed of Gerard, p. 611. This was “common in gardens and rich cultivated ground” in 1785.—Cutler, l. c. Few plants have spread so widely over the earth as Stellaria media.

Great comfrey (Gerard, p. 806),—Symphytum officinale, L.: also in the list of garden herbs at p. 90. “Sometimes found growing wild,”—Cutler (1785), l. c. Not admitted by Dr. Bigelow (Fl. Bost.), but included by Dr. Gray as an adventive.—Man., p. 320.

Gerard, p. 757,—Maruta cotula (L.), DC.; a naturalized member of our Flora, now become a very common ornament of roadsides; where Cutler notices it, also, in 1785.

“Great burre-docke, or clott-burre” (Gerard, p. 809),—Lappa major, Gaertn. “About barns,”—Cutler (1785), l. c.

“White-floured mullein” (Gerard, p. 773),—perhaps Verbascum Lychnitis, L.; which is adventive in some parts of the United States (Gray, Man., p. 283), but is not otherwise known to have made its appearance in New England. Great mullein (V. Thapsus, L.) was “common” in Cutler’s time. The moth-mullein (V. Blattaria, L.) he only knew “by roadsides in Lynn” (l. c., p. 419). Other plants referable to this list of naturalized weeds are “wild sorrel,” p. 42; Polygonum Persicaria, p. 43; St. John’s wort, speedwell, chickweed, male fluellin, cat-mint, and clot-bur, p. 44; yarrow, and oak of Jerusalem, p. 46; pimpernel, and toadflax, p. 48; and wild purslain, and woad-waxen, p. 51. See also spearmint, and ground-ivy, p. 89; and elecampane, celandine, and tansy, p. 90.

The earliest, almost the only account that we have of the gardens of our fathers, after they had settled themselves in their New England, and had tamed its rugged coasts to obedience to English husbandry. What with their garden beans, and Indian beans, and pease (“as good as ever I eat in England,” says Higginson in 1629); their beets, parsnips, turnips, and carrots (“our turnips, parsnips, and carrots are both bigger and sweeter than is ordinary to be found in England,” says the same reverend writer); their cabbages and asparagus,—both thriving, we are told, exceedingly; their radishes and lettuce; their sorrel, parsley, chervil, and marigold, for pot-herbs; and their sage, thyme, savory of both kinds, clary, anise, fennel, coriander, spearmint, and pennyroyal, for sweet herbs,—not to mention the Indian pompions and melons and squanter-squashes, “and other odde fruits of the country,”—the first-named of which had got to be so well approved among the settlers, when Josselyn wrote in 1672, that what he calls “the ancient New-England standing dish” (we may well call it so now!) was made of them; and, finally, their pleasant, familiar flowers, lavender-cotton and hollyhocks and satin (“we call this herbe, in Norfolke, sattin,” says Gerard; “and, among our women, it is called honestie”) and gillyflowers, which meant pinks as well, and dear English roses, and eglantine,—yes, possibly, hedges of eglantine (p. 90 note),—surely the gardens of New England, fifty years after the settlement of the country, were as well stocked as they were a hundred and fifty years after. Nor were the first planters long behindhand in fruit. Even at his first visit, in 1639, our author was treated with “half a score very fair pippins,” from the Governor’s Island in Boston Harbor; though there was then, he says (Voyages, p. 29), “not one apple tree nor pear planted yet in no part of the countrey but upon that island.” But he has a much better account to give in 1671: “The quinces, cherries, damsons, set the dames a work. Marmalad and preserved damsons is to be met with in every house. Our fruit-trees prosper abundantly,—apple-trees, pear-trees, quince-trees, cherry-trees, plum-trees, barberry-trees. I have observed, with admiration, that the kernels sown, or the succors planted, produce as fair and good fruit, without graffing, as the tree from whence they were taken. The countrey is replenished with fair and large orchards. It was affirmed by one Mr. Woolcut (a magistrate in Connecticut Colony), at the Captain’s messe (of which I was), aboard the ship I came home in, that he made five hundred hogsheads of syder out of his own orchard in one year.”—Voyages, p. 189-90. Our barberry-bushes, now so familiar inhabitants of the hedgerows of Eastern New England, should seem from this to have come, with the eglantines, from the gardens of the first settlers. Barberries “are planted in most of our English gardens,” says Gerard.

Portulaca oleracea,; L. β. sativa, L. (garden purslain). The wild variety is also reckoned by our author, in his list of plants, common to us and the Old World (p. 51).

See Josselyn’s Voyages, p. 188.

Vicia Faba, Willd., of which the Windsor bean is a variety. The author compares it, at p. 56, with kidney-beans (Phaseolus vulgaris, L.), called Indian beans by the first settlers, who had them from the savages, to the advantage of the last-mentioned sort; which probably soon drove the other out of our gardens.—Compare Cobbett’s American Gardener, p. 105.

Gerard, p. 75,—Avena nuda, L.; derived from common oats (A. sativa, L.) according to Link; and also (in Gerard’s time, and even later) in cultivation. It was called pillcorn, or peelcorn, because the grains, when ripe, drop naked from the husks. But is it not possible that our author’s Silpee (comparable with apee, a leaf; toopee, a root; ahpee, a bow, in the Micmac language,— Mass. Hist. Coll., vol. vi., pp. 20, 24) was really the American name of the well-known water-oats, or Canada rice,—Zizania aquatica, L.; the deciduous grains of which are said to afford “a very good meal” (Loudon, Encycl., p. 788), with the qualities of rice?—See Bigel., Fl. Bost., edit. 3, p. 369. This has long been used by our savages; but I have not met with any mention of it in the early writers. The “standing dish in New England” has its interest, if it were really made of Canada rice.

Gerard, p. 680,—Mentha viridis, L. It perhaps soon became naturalized. “In moist ground” (1785).—Cutler, l. c.

Perhaps only an inference of the author’s, from the southern origin of these three shrubs. Lavender also belongs naturally to a warmer climate.