Chapter V: Part 5

[180] 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.

[181] _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.

[182] _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.

[183] 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.

[184] _Populus_, L. Our species are peculiar to the country, as the author’s remark suggests. Wood (_l. c._) notices “the ever-trembling asps.”

[185] “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.”

[186] _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.

[187] _Genista tinctoria_, L. (_Genistella tinctoria_,—greenweed, or dyers’ weed; Gerard, p. 1316). “We shall not need to speake of the use that diers make thereof,” says the latter. Our author could hardly have been mistaken about so well-known a plant as this; which he probably met with in one of his visits to the neighborhood of Boston,—long the only American station for it. There is a tradition that it was introduced here by Gov. Endicott; which may have been some forty years before Josselyn finished his herborizing,—enough to account for its naturalization then. It was long confined to Salem (“pastures between New Mills and Salem,”—_Cutler_, _l. c._, 1785); but occurred to me sparingly, in 1841, on the shores of Cambridge Bay, and also on roadsides in Old Cambridge. “Woad-seed” is set down, in a memorandum of the Governor and Company of Massachusetts Bay, before February, 1628, to be sent to New England (Mass. Col. Rec., vol. i. p. 24); and though _Isatis tinctoria_, L., is true woad, _Reseda luteola_, L. (wold, or weld), and our _Genista_ (woadwaxen), have, it is said (Rees’s Cycl., _in loco_), been known “in English herbals under that name.”

[188] “Current-bushes are of two kinds,—red and black. The black currents, which are larger than the red, ... are reasonable pleasant in eating.”—_Voyages_, p. 72. Our black currant is _Ribes floridum_, Herit.,—considered by Linnæus (Sp. Pl., p. 291) only a variety of _R. nigrum_, L., the true black currant of the gardens; and our red currant, which I have gathered in the White Mountains,—far below the region of _R. rigens_, Michx., the more common red currant there,—appears to be undistinguishable from _R. rubrum_, L. (the red currant of gardens); unless, possibly, as an American variety of it. This is probably _R. albinervium_, Michx. (Fl., vol. i. p. 110; Pursh, Fl., vol. i. p. 163).

[189] _Polyporus_, Mich., sp.—In his Voyages, p. 70, the author speaks of “a stately tree growing here and there in valleys, not like to any trees in Europe; having a smooth bark, of a dark-brown colour, the leaves like great maple in England called sycamor; but larger,”—which may be _Platanus occidentalis_, L. (button-wood). And Wood enables us to add one more to this early account of the genera of plants, which we possess, common to the Old World. He tells us (New-England’s Prospect, chap. v.) “the hornbound tree is a tough kind of wood, that requires so much pains in riving as is almost incredible; being the best to make bowls and dishes, not being subject to crack or leak. This tree growing with broad-spread arms, the vines twist their curling branches about them; which vines afford great store of grapes,” &c. This was our American hornbeam (_Carpinus Americana_, L.). And the same author again alludes to it, in verse, as—

“The horn-bound tree, that to be cloven scorns;
Which from the tender vine oft takes his spouse,
Who twines embracing arms about his boughs.”

A pleasant enough illustration of what taught classical husbandry,—“_ulmis adjungere vites_.”—_Georg._, i. 2.

[190] See also the Voyages, p. 73. “It is almost incredible,” says Higginson (New-England’s Plantation, _l. c._, p. 118), “what great gaine some of our English planters have had by our Indian corne. Credible persons have assured me,—and the partie himselfe avouched the truth of it to me,—that, of the setting of thirteen gallons of corne, hee hath had encrease of it 52 hogsheads; every hogshead holding seven bushels, of London measure: and every bushell was by him sold and trusted to the Indians for so much beaver as was worth 18 shillings. And so, of this 13 gallons of corne, which was worth 6 shillings 8 pence, he made about 327 pounds of it the yeere following, as by reckoning will appeare; where you may see how God blessed husbandry in this land. There is not such greate and plentifull eares of corne, I suppose, any where else to bee found but in this countrey; because, also of varietie of colours,—as red, blew, and yellow, &c.: and of one corne there springeth four or five hundred.” Roger Williams (Key, _l. c._, pp. 208, 221) has some interesting particulars of the Indian use of their corn. According to him, the Indian _msickquatash_ (that is succotash, as we call it now) was “boiled corn whole,” and _nawsaump_, a kind of meal pottage unparched. From this the English call their samp; which is the Indian corn beaten and boiled, and eaten, hot or cold; with milk or butter,—which are mercies beyond the natives’ plain water, and which is a dish exceeding wholesome for the English bodies.

[191] _Acorus Calamus_, L.; common to Europe and America. In his Voyages, p. 77, the author drops properly, in mentioning this, the injurious prefix. It seems that our New-England forefathers used the leaves to cover their cold floors, as they had used rushes at home; and, according to Sir W. J. Hooker (Br. Fl., vol. i. p. 159), the pleasant smell of the plant has recommended it, in like manner, “for strewing on the floor of the cathedral at Norwich, on festival days.”

[192] _Allium Canadense_, L., probably.—See also p. 55, note 4.

[193] “Knaves’-mustard (for that it is too bad for honest men).”—_Gerard_, p. 262. The “New-England mustard,” which was like it, may be _Lepidium Virginicum_, L.; which, having “a taste like common garden-cress, or peppergrass” (Bigel., Fl. Bost., _in loco_), perhaps attracted the first settlers.

[194] The “many flowers,” with reflexed sepals, perhaps refer this to our noble American Turk’s-cap (_Lilium superbum_, L.), rather than to the yellow lily (_L. Canadense_, L.).

[195] See p. 81.

[196] “They take their _wuttammauog_,—that is, a weak tobacco,—which the men plant themselves, very frequently. Yet I never see any take so excessively as I have seen men in Europe; and yet excess were more tolerable in them, because they want the refreshing of beer and wine, which God had vouchsafed Europe.”—_R. Williams_, _Key_, _l. c._, p. 213. And, in another place, the same writer says that tobacco is “commonly the only plant which men labour in” (he is speaking of the Indians); “the women managing all the rest” (p. 208). Wood, in his list of Indian words (New-Eng. Prospect, _ad ult._), spells the Indian word, above given, _ottommaocke_,—(perhaps both are comparable with “_wuttahimneash_, strawberries” Williams, _l. c._, p. 220), and “_weetimoquat_, it smells sweet” (Vocab. of Narraganset Lang., in Hist. Coll., vol. v. p. 82); _og_, _ock_, and _ash_, being all plural terminations; between which and “the noun in the singular one or more consonants or vowels are frequently interspersed” (_ibid._, vol. iii. p. 222, note); and _oquat_, from the context, the verbal; and the root appearing possibly the same,—and also defines it as tobacco. There is much other testimony that the New-England savages were found using “tobacco” (as Mourt’s Relation, _l. c._, p. 230; and Winslow’s Relation, _l. c._, p. 253); but our author’s text, above, appears to distinguish the true herb, “not much planted,” from “a small kind called _pooke_,” which “the Indians make use of.” And again, more clearly, in his Voyages, we have to the same effect: “the Indians in New England use a small, round-leafed tobacco, called by them or the fishermen _poke_. It is odious to the English.... Of marchantable ... tobacco, ... there is little of it planted in New England; neither have they” (both clauses appear to refer to the English) “learned the right way of curing of it.” This “marchantable tobacco” was no doubt mainly _Nicotiana tabacum_, L.; but the other kind, the weak tobacco,—cultivated, as Williams tells us, by the Indians, and recognized as tobacco by the English,—was not, as Wood says (N. E. Prospect, _l. c._), colt’s-foot, but _Nicotiana rustica_, L. (the yellow henbane of Gerard’s Herbal, p. 356), well known to have been long in cultivation among the American savages, and now a naturalized relic of that cultivation in various parts of the United States. The name, _poke_, or _pooke_,—if it be, as is supposable, the same with “_puck_, smoke,” of the Narraganset vocabulary of R. Williams (Hist. Coll., vol. v. p. 84),—was perhaps always indefinite, and, since Cutler’s day, has been applied in New England to the green hellebore (_Veratrum viride_, Ait.); but this was not, it is evident, the poke of the first settlers. The name is also given to _Phytolacca decandra_, L. (the _skoke_ of Cutler), and the hellebore apparently distinguished from this as Indian poke; but the application of the name to the former, at least, probably had its origin among the whites.

[197] The figure sufficiently exhibits _Sarracenia purpurea_, L.

[198] “Live-for-ever. It is a kind of cud-weed.... It growes now plentifully in our English gardens.... The fishermen, when they want” (that is, lack) “tobacco, take this herb; being cut and dryed.”—_Voyages_, p. 78; where the author adds the peculiar medicinal virtues of the plant, which are the same as those assigned by Gerard (p. 644) to the genus. Compare, as to this, Wood and Bache, Dispens., p. 1334. The species intended by Josselyn is our everlasting (_Antennaria margaritacea_ (L.) Br.), described by Gerard, and figured by Johnson in his edition of the former (p. 641), and first published by Clusius (_Gnaphalium Americanum_, Rar. Pl. Hist., vol. i. p. 327) in 1601. Clusius had it from England, says Johnson. The dried herb, used by the fishermen instead of tobacco, and no doubt called by them _poke_, may have been mistaken by Wood for colt’s-foot, the leaves of which were “smoked by the ancients in pulmonary complaints; ... and, in some parts of Germany, are at the present time said to be substituted for tobacco.”—_Wood and Bache_, _Dispens._, p. 1401. _Cornus sericea_, L.,—“called by the natives squaw-bush” (Williamson’s Hist. Maine, vol. i. p. 125), and by the western Indians _kinnikinnik_ (Gray, Man., p. 161); furnished, in its inner bark (on the medicinal properties of which, see especially Rees’s Cycl., Amer. ed., _in loco_), a substitute for _Nicotiana_,—very widely approved among the native Americans. The name, Indian tobacco, given to _Lobelia inflata_, L. (the emetic-weed of Cutler, _l. c._, p. 484; who “first attracted to it the attention of the profession”), by the whites, is in some connections confusing, and might well be displaced by wild tobacco, which is also in popular use.

[199] _Œnothera biennis_, L. (Johnson’s Gerard, p. 475),—known to Europeans, according to Linnæus (Sp. Pl., p. 493), as early as 1614; but first described and figured by Prosper Alpinus, in his posthumous _De Pl. Exoticis_, p. 325, t. 324, _cit._ L. Johnson says that Parkinson gave it the English name of tree-primrose, which it still keeps. It is “vulgarly known by the name of scabish (a corruption, probably of scabious)” in the country.—_Bigel. Fl. Bost._, _in loco_. Josselyn describes the plant in his Voyages, p. 78.

[200] _Adiantum pedatum_, L.—The European _A. Camillus veneris_, L., long used as a pectoral (the _sirop de capillaire_ of French shops being made of it), is, according to Messrs. Wood and Bache (Dispens., p. 1290), “feebler” than our species, which Josselyn recommends.

[201] See pp. 67, 68.

[202] Johnson’s Gerard, p. 183: which is perhaps _Allium magicum_, L.; for which our _A. tricoccum_, Ait., may have been mistaken.—See also p. 54 of this; note.

[203] _Epilobium angustifolium_, L. (rosebay willow-herbe of Gerard by Johnson); which last figures it at p. 477: common to Europe and America; but some botanists have, like Josselyn, reckoned the American plant “proper to the country.”

[204] _Helianthus_, L. (Gerard, p. 751), a genus peculiar to America; called “American marygold” in the Voyages (p. 59), where it is set down among the more striking of our New-England flowers. At p. 82 of this book, the author gives a cut of the “marygold of America,” which he describes. It is probably the second one above mentioned, and perhaps _H. strumosus_, L., Gray. The other kind, with “black seeds,” was probably _H. divaricatus_, L.

[205] See p. 47. The earth-nuts of Gerard (p. 1064) are species of _Bulbocastanum_ of authors.

[206] Not clear to me. But, taking the alleged virtues and the station into account, our author may mean here the rather striking American sea-rocket (_Cakile Americana_, Nutt.); which, it is likely, occurred to him. Spurge-time (p. 43) also grows on “sea-banks.”

[207] “French beans; or, rather, American beans. The herbalists call them kidney-beans, from their shape and effects; for they strengthen the kidneys. They are variegated much,—some being bigger, a great deal, than others; some white, black, red, yellow, blue, spotted: besides your _Bonivis_, and _Calavances_, and the kidney-bean that is proper to Ronoake. But these are brought into the country: the other are natural to the climate.”—_Josselyn’s Voyages_, p. 73-4. R. Williams (Key, _l. c._, p. 208) gives _manusquussedash_ as the Indian word for beans. Cornuti (whose book, indeed, is not confined to Canadian plants; though, on the other hand, he was sometimes ill informed of the true locality of his specimens; as in the case of _Asclepias Cornuti_, Decsne, which he published as _A. Syriaca_) figures and describes, at pp. 184-5, _Phaseolus multiflorus_, L.; and this may possibly have been raised from seeds procured by French missionaries from the Canadian savages: but _P. vulgaris_, L., our well-known bush-bean, is doubtless what Josselyn has mainly in view, as cultivated by the native Americans.

[208] “_Askutasquash_,—their vine-apples,—which the English, from them, call squashes: about the bigness of apples of several colours.”—_R. Williams_, _Key, &c._, _l. c._, p. 222. “In summer, when their corn is spent, _isquotersquashes_ is their best bread; a fruit much like a pumpion.”—_Wood_, _New-Eng. Prospect_, part 2, chap. vi. The late Dr. T. W. Harris made the ill-understood edible gourds a special object of study, and devoted particular attention to the ascertaining of the kinds cultivated by the American savages; but his papers have not as yet seen the light. The warted squash (_Cucurbita verrucosa_, L.) and the orange-gourd (_C. aurantium_, Willd.)—the fruit of which last is of the size and color of an orange, and “more tender than the common pompion” (Loudon, Encycl. Pl.)—are perhaps, in part, intended by our author.

[209] “Pompions and water-mellons, too, they have good store,” says our author (Voyages, p. 130); and again, at p. 74 of the same, “The water-melon is proper to the countrie. The flesh of it is of a flesh-colour; a rare cooler of feavers, and excellent against the stone.” The water-melon (_Cucurbita citrullus_, L.) is “the only medicine the common people use in ardent fevers,” in Egypt (Loudon, _l. c._). _Cucurbita pepo_, L. (Gr. πέπων; Low Dutch, _pepoen_, _pompoen_; Fr., _pompone_), is our English pompion, or pumpkin. At p. 91, Josselyn speaks of pompions “proper to the country.” Compare Gerard’s chapter “of melons, or pompions” (Johnson’s Gerard, p. 918), where are two Virginian sorts; and see “the ancient New-England standing dish,” at p. 91 of this book. The evidence appears to be sufficient, that our savages had in cultivation, together with their corn and tobacco,—and, like these, derived originally from tropical regions,—several sorts of what we call squashes, some kinds of pompion, and also water-melons; and, Graves’s letter (New-England Plantation, _l. c._, p. 124) adds, musk-melons. See further, especially, Champlain (Voy. de la Nouv. France, _passim_) and L’Escarbot (Hist. de la Nouv. France, vol. ii. p. 836). Mr. A. De Candolle (Geogr. Bot., vol. ii. pp. 899, 904) disputes the American origin of the edible gourds, but does not appear to have examined all the early authorities for their cultivation by the savages before the settlement of this country. Such cultivation appears to be made out, and to indicate that these vegetables have probably been known, from very remote antiquity, in the warmer parts of America. But this does not touch the difficult question of origin; and it may still appear that the gourds are equally ancient in Europe, and derived, both here and there, from Asia (De Cand., _l. c._); such derivation being explainable, in the case of America, by old migrations from Asia through Polynesia.—_Pickering_, _Races of Man_, chap. 17.

[210] Johnson’s Gerard, p. 528; where the same plant is also called “jagged or rose penniwoort,” and is probably what our author intends at p. 43 of this. It was no doubt our pretty _Saxifraga Virginiensis_, Michx., which Josselyn had in view. In his Voyages, p. 80, he assigns to it the medicinal virtues which Gerard attributes to the great navel-wort, or wall-pennywort (_Cotyledon umbilicus_, Huds.).

[211] _Convolvulus sepium_, L. (great bind-weed) is exceedingly like to _C. Scammonia_, L., the inspissated juice of which is the officinal scammony; and is common to Europe and North America. Gerard’s bryony of Peru (p. 872-3), to which Josselyn refers, is, whatever it be, not found here. Compare Cutler’s remarks on _C. sepium_ (Account of Veg., &c., _l. c._, p. 416). _Mechoacan_, “called ... Indian briony, or briony, or scammony of America,” from the Caribbee Islands, &c., is described in Hughes, Amer. Physitian (1672), p. 94; and see Wood and Bache, Dispens., p. 424, note.

[212] _Rosa Carolina_, L. (Carolina rose), probably.—See Cutler’s observations, _l. c._, p. 451. Higginson also notices “single damaske roses, verie sweete.”—_New-Eng. Plantation_, _l. c._, p. 119. Our Carolina rose is said to be common in English shrubberies.

[213] See also Voyages, p. 72. Our author is the earliest authority that I have met with for this name; and his plant, which is placed among those “proper to the country,” may very well be what has long been called sweet-fern in New England,—_Comptonia asplenifolia_ (L.) Ait.; still used in “molasses beer,” and medicinal in the way mentioned.—_Emerson_, _Trees and Shrubs of Mass._, p. 226.

[214] See Josselyn’s Voyages, p. 77. The first of the two plants which the author mentions here is probably _Aralia nudicaulis_, L. (wild sarsaparilla); and the other, _A. hispida_, Michx. The last, which is what is spoken of in the Voyages, has been recommended for medicinal properties by Prof. Peck.—_Wood and Bache_, _Dispens._, p. 116.

[215] “_Attitaash_ (whortleberries), of which there are divers sorts; sweet, like currants; some opening, some of a binding nature. _Sautaash_ are these currants dried by the natives, and so preserved all the year; which they beat to powder, and mingle it with their parched meal, and make a delicate dish which they call _sautauthig_, which is as sweet to them as plum or spice cake to the English.”—_R. Williams_, _Key, &c._, _l. c._, p. 221. The fruitful and wholesome American whortleberries, or bilberries, were, it is likely, a very pleasant discovery to our forefathers. It was, no doubt, those species that we call blueberries which they made most of, and particularly the low blueberry (_Vaccinium Pennsylvanicum_, Lam.) and the swamp-blueberry (_V. corymbosum_, L.). From these the common black whortleberry (_Gaylussacia resinosa_, Torr. and Gray) differs no less in quality than in structure. _Sa’té_ (compare _sautaash_, above), in Rasles Dict. of the Abnaki Language, _l. c._, p. 450, is rendered “_frais, sans etre secs; lorsq’ils s’t secs, sikisa’tar_.”

[216] The cloud-berry—_Rubus chamæmorus_, L. (Gerard, p. 1420)—is found in some parts of the subalpine region of the White Mountains; and Mr. Oakes detected it at Lubec, on the coast of Maine. It is common to both continents; and perhaps, therefore, as our author gives his cloud-berry a place in this division of his book, he may have meant something else.

[217] _Rhus_, L.; the species differing, as our author repeats in his Voyages (p. 71), “from all the kinds set down in our English herbals.” Wood (N. Eng. Prospect, chap, v.) calls it “the dear shumach.” Josselyn’s account of the virtues of our species, here, and especially in the Voyages (_l. c._), agrees so well with what Gerard says of the properties of the European tanner’s sumach (_R. coriaria_, L.), that the latter may very likely have, in part, suggested the former. But see Cutler, _l. c._, p. 427.

[218] “The cherry-trees yield great store of cherries, which grow on clusters like grapes. They be much smaller than our English cherry; nothing near so good, if they be not fully ripe. They so furr the mouth, that the tongue will cleave to the roof, and the throat wax hoarse with swallowing those red bullies (as I may call them); being little better in taste” (that is, than bullaces). “English ordering may bring them to an English cherry; but they are as wild as the Indians.”—_New-England’s Prospect_, chap. v. The choke-cherry (_Cerasus Virginiana_ (L.) DC.) and the wild cherry (_C. serotina_ (Ehrh.) DC.) are meant.

[219] _Pinus Strobus_, L. (white pine). “Of the body the English make large canows of 20 foot long, and two foot and a half over; hollowing of them with an adds, and shaping of the outside like a boat.”—_Josselyn’s Voyages_, p. 64; where is more concerning the use of this tree in medicine. “I have seen,” says Wood, “of these stately, high-grown trees, ten miles together, close by the river-side; from whence, by shipping, they might be conveyed to any desired port.”—_New-Eng. Prospect_, chap. v.

[220] _Abies balsamea_ (L.) Marsh, (balsam-fir). “The firr-tree is a large tree, too; but seldom so big as the pine. The bark is smooth, with knobs, or blisters, in which lyeth clear liquid turpentine,—very good to be put into salves and oyntments. The leaves, or cones, boiled in beer, are good for the scurvie. The young buds are excellent to put into epithemes for warts and corns. The rosen is altogether as good as frankincense.... The knots of this tree and fat-pine are used by the English instead of candles; and it will burn a long time: but it makes the people pale” (Josselyn’s Voyages, p. 66); besides being, as Wood says (_l. c._, speaking of the pine), “something sluttish.” But Higginson says they “are very usefull in a house, and ... burne as cleere as a torch.”—_New-Eng. Plantation_, _l. c._, p. 122.

[221] _Larix Americana_, Michx. (Larch; “_taccamahac_,” Cutler; _tamarack_; _hackmatack_.) “Groundsels, made of larch-tree, will never rot; and the longer it lyes, the harder it growes, that you may almost drive a nail into a bar of iron as easily as into that.”—_Josselyn’s Voyages_, p. 68. “The turpentine that issueth from the cones of the larch-tree (which comes nearest of any to the right turpentine) is singularly good to heal wounds, and to draw out the malice (or thorn, as Helmont phrases it) of any ach; rubbing the place therewith, and throwing upon it the powder of sage-leaves.”—_Ibid._, p. 66.

[222] _Abies nigra_, Poir. (black or double spruce), and probably also _A. alba_, Michx. (white or single spruce). “At Pascataway there is now a spruce-tree, brought down to the water-side by our mass-men, of an incredible bigness, and so long that no skipper durst ever yet adventure to ship it; but there it lyes and rots.”—_Josselyn’s Voyages_, p. 67.

[223] _Abies Canadensis_ (L.), Michx. (hemlock spruce). Beside the coniferous trees here set down, our author mentions in his Voyages (p. 67) “the white cedar, ... a stately tree, and is taken by some to be tamarisk.” This, which is probably our white cedar (_Cupressus thyoides_, L.), he says “the English saw into boards to floor their rooms; for which purpose it is excellent, long-lasting, and wears very smooth and white. Likewise they make shingles to cover their houses with, instead of tyle. It will never warp.” Wood (New-Eng. Prospect, chap. v.) makes mention of a “cedar-tree, ... a tree of no great growth; not bearing above a foot and a half, at the most; neither is it very high.... This wood is more desired for ornament than substance; being of colour red and white, like eugh; smelling as sweet as juniper. It is commonly used for ceiling of houses, and making of chests, boxes, and staves.” This seems likely to have been the American _Arbor vitæ_ (_Thya occidentalis_, L.); also called white-cedar.—Compare Emerson, Trees and Shrubs of Mass., pp. 96, 100. For mention of the juniper, see _ante_, p. 49.

[224] See p. 81; and _ante_, p. 54.

[225] _Sassafras officinale_, Nees. “This tree growes not beyond Black Point, eastward.”—_Josselyn’s Voyages_, p. 68. Michaux (Sylva, vol. ii. p. 144) says, “The neighbourhood of Portsmouth ... may be assumed as one of the extreme points at which it is found towards the north-east;” but, according to Mr. Emerson (Trees and Shrubs of Mass., p. 322), it is “found as far north as Canada,” though ... “there a small tree.”

[226] _Vaccinium macrocarpum_, Ait. Our author seems not to have known the European cranberry (_V. oxycoccus_, L., the marish-wortes, or fenne-berries, of Gerard, p. 1419); which is also found in our cold bogs, especially upon mountains. This is called by Sir W. J. Hooker (Br. Fl., vol. i. p. 178), “far superior to the foreign _V. macrocarpon_;” but, from Gerard’s account, it should appear that it was formerly much less thought of in England than was ours (according to Josselyn) here, by both Indians and English. Linnæus speaks of the European fruit in much the same way, in 1737, in his Flora of Lapland, where he says, “_Baccæ hæ a Lapponibus in usum cibarium non vocantur, nec facile ab aliis nationibus, cum nimis acidæ sint_” (Fl. Lapp., p. 145): but corrects this in a paper on the esculent plants of Sweden, in 1752; asking, not without animation, “_Harum vero cum saccharo præparata gelatina, quid in mensis nostris jucundius?_” (Amæn. Acad., t. iii. p. 86.) Our American cranberry was probably the “_sasemineash_—another sharp, cooling fruit, growing in fresh waters all the winter; excellent in conserve against fevers”—of R. Williams, Key, _l. c._, p. 221.—Compare _Masimin_, rendered [_fruits_] “_rouges petits_.”—_Rasles’ Dict._, _Abnaki_, _l. c._, p. 460.

[227] Wood says the “vines afford great store of grapes, which are very big, both for the grape and cluster; sweet and good. These be of two sorts,—red and white. There is likewise a smaller kind of grape which groweth in the islands” (that is, of Massachusetts Bay), “which is sooner ripe, and more delectable; so that there is no known reason why as good wine may not be made in those parts, as well as Bordeaux in France; being under the same degree.”—_New-Eng. Prospect_, chap. v. “Vines,” says Mr. Graves (in New-Eng. Plantation, Hist. Coll., vol. i. p. 124) “doe grow here, plentifully laden with the biggest grapes that ever I saw. Some I have seene foure inches about.”—“Our Governour,” adds Higginson, “hath already planted a vineyard, with great hope of encrease.”—_New-England’s Plantation_, _l. c._, p. 119. _Vitis Labrusca_, L. (fox-grape),—for some principal varieties of which, see Emerson, _l. c._, p. 468,—furnished, probably, most of the sorts known favorably to the first settlers; but _V. æstivalis_, Michx. (summer grape), also occurs on our seaboard.

[228] _Pyrola_, L., emend. (Gerard, p. 408). All but one of our species are common also to Europe.

[229] _Goodyera pubescens_ (Willd.), R. Br., is plainly meant by the author; and the common name of the plant—rattlesnake plantain—still preserves the memory of its supposed virtues as a wound-herb. It seems, by the next page, that Josselyn tried to carry living specimens to England; but they “perished at sea.” The putting this among the _Pyrolæ_ (as if by some confusion of _Goodyera_ with _Chimophila maculata_) was a bad mistake.

[230] See p. 55; where the author refers to his figures of two kinds of “_Pyrola_” of which this must be one. The Voyages (p. 202) also make mention of an adventure of a neighbor of Josselyn’s, who, “rashly wandering out after some stray’d cattle, lost his way; and coming, as we conceived by his Relation, near to the head-spring of some of the branches of Black-Point River or Saco River, light into a tract of land, for God knows how many miles, full of delfes and dingles and dangerous precipices, rocks, and inextricable difficulties, which did justly daunt, yea, quite deter him from endeavouring to pass any further.” And this account may quite possibly relate to the same occasion of our author’s getting acquainted with his “elegant plant.” Plukenet (Amalth., p. 94; Phytogr., tab. 287, f. 5) mistakenly refers Josselyn’s “sufficiently unhappy figure” to his _Filix Hemionitis dicta Maderensis_; which is _Adiantum reniforme_, L.

[231] “There is a plant, likewise,—called, for want of a name, clowne’s wound-wort, by the English; though it be not the same,—that will heal a green wound in 24 hours, if a wise man have the ordering of it.”—_Voyages_, p. 60. _Verbena hastata_, L. (blue vervain), is perhaps, notwithstanding the author’s disclaimer, what he had in view. This is certainly different from the common, once officinal, vervain of Europe (_V. officinalis_, L.),—on the virtues of which, as a wound-herb, see Gerard, p. 718; but yet more so from true clown’s all-heal (Gerard, p. 1005), which is _Stachys palustris_, L. As to other medicinal properties of our vervains, compare Cutler, _l. c._, p. 405,—where they are said to have been used by the surgeons of our army in the Revolutionary War,—and Wood and Bache, Dispens., p. 1403.

[232] _Symplocarpus fœtidus_ (L.) Salisb. (skunk-cabbage). Our author’s appears to be the first figure and account of this curious plant, which he rightly places among such “as are proper to the country, and have no name.” Cutler’s description, in 1785 (Account of Indig. Veg., _l. c._, pp. 407-9),—which is followed by the remark, that “the fructification so essentially differs from all the genera of this order, it must undoubtedly be considered as a new genus,”—was the next contribution of importance, and so continued till Dr. Bigelow’s elaborate history;—_Amer. Med. Bot._, vol. ii. p. 41, pl. xxiv. Josselyn’s “sprig” of a horse-tail might perhaps be added to his _Filices_, at p. 47, note 2, 3.

[233] _Impatiens fulva_, Nutt, (touch-me-not; balsam). Wilson says this plant “is the greatest favorite with the humming-bird of all our other flowers. In some places where these plants abound, you may see at one time ten or twelve humming-birds darting about, and fighting with and pursuing each other.”—_Amer. Ornithol._, _by Brewer_, p. 120. As to Josselyn’s note on its use in medicine by the Indians, compare Wood and Bache, Disp., p. 1345. A kix, or kex, or kexy,—used in the expression, “hollow as a kix,”—is a provincialism, in various parts of England, for hemlock; “the dry, hollow stocks of hemlock” (whence Webster’s query,—Fr., _cique_; Lat. _cicuta_); and also of cow-parsley, according to Holloway (Dict. of Provincialisms): that is to say, secondarily, any hollow-stemmed plant like hemlock. Gerard’s figure of _Impatiens noli tangere_, L., the European balsam,—of which the earlier botanists considered our species to be varieties,—is so poor, and the plant so rare in Britain, that it is perhaps little wonder that our author took the showy American balsam to be quite new.

[234] _Mulgedium leucophœum_, DC. (Gray, Manual, p. 241). This fine plant is peculiar to America.

[235] _Nabalus albus_ (L.) Hook. (Snake-weed): the genus peculiar to America.

[236] _Chelone glabra_, L. (snake-head). Plukenet quotes this figure under _Digitalis Verbesinæ foliis_, &c. (Amalth., p. 71; Mant., p. 64); which is referred by Linnæus to _Gerardia pedicularis_, L. Plukenet has himself figured our plant, and but little better than Josselyn, in Phytogr., t. 348, fig. 3. The genus is peculiar to America.

[237] Upon this figure, Plukenet founds his _Solanum quadrifolium Nov’ Anglicanum, flore lacteo polycoccum_ (Amalth., p. 195); clearly taking the plant, as Josselyn did, for “a kind of _Herba Paris_” (_Paris quadrifolia_, L.), which is _Solanum quadrifolium bacciferum_ of Bauhin (Pin., p. 167, _cit._ L.). The plant is doubtless _Cornus Canadensis_, L. (dwarf-cornel; bunch-berry); and it certainly resembles the figure of _Herb Paris_, given by Gerard (p. 405), much more than that of _Cornus suecica_, L. (European dwarf-cornel, p. 1296),—a shrub ill understood by the old botanists.

[238] _Helianthus_, L., sp. (sun-flower); a genus peculiar to America. The species is perhaps _H. strumosus_, L. (Gray, Man., p. 218).—See p. {56} of this book; note.

[239] The importance of this list has been already spoken of. Its value depends on its having been drawn up by a person of familiarity with some of the botanical writers of his day, as part of a botanical treatise; and the (in this case) not unfair presumption that the names cited are meant to be accurate. Mr. A. De Candolle (_Geogr. Botanique_, vol. ii. p. 746) appears to be unacquainted with any authority for the naturalized plants of the Northern States earlier than the first edition of the _Florula_ of Dr. Bigelow, in 1814. The treatise of Cutler extends this limit to 1785; and that of Josselyn, so far as it goes, to 1672.

[240] Doubtful. Gerard’s couch-grass, p. 23, appears to be _Holcus mollis_, L.,—“the true couch-grass of sandy soils” in England; and English agricultural writers reckon yet other grasses of this name, beside the well-known _Triticum repens_, L.

[241] Gerard, p. 276,—_Capsella Bursa Pastoris_ (L.), Moench. “Cornfields, and about barns,”—_Cutler_ (1785), _l. c._ Naturalized.

[242] 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._

[243] 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.

[244] _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.

[245] 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.

[246] Garden nightshade (Gerard, p. 339); _Solanum nigrum_, L. “Common among rubbish,”—_Cutler_ (1785), _l. c._ Naturalized.

[247] Common stinging-nettle, or great nettle (Gerard, p. 706),—_Urtica dioica_, L.

[248] 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.

[249] “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.

[250] 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.

[251] 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.

[252] 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.

[253] 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.

[254] 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.

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

[256] “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.

[257] 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_.

[258] 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.

[259] 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.

[260] “Great burre-docke, or clott-burre” (Gerard, p. 809),—_Lappa major_, Gaertn. “About barns,”—_Cutler_ (1785), _l. c._

[261] “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.

[262] 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.

[263] _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).

[264] See Josselyn’s Voyages, p. 188.

[265] _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.

[266] 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.

[267] Gerard, p. 680,—_Mentha viridis_, L. It perhaps soon became naturalized. “In moist ground” (1785).—_Cutler, l. c._

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

[269] Gerard, p. 1109,—_Santolina Chamæ Cyparissus_, L.

[270] Gerard, p. 856,—_Glechoma hederacea_, L.; once of great medicinal repute: which accounts for our author’s finding it, as it should seem, among garden-herbs. It has become naturalized and very familiar in New England. Cutler finds it wild in 1785. Mr. Bentham refers it to _Nepeta_, but substitutes a new specific name for that given by Linnæus, which is based on the ancient names, and has at least the right of priority.

[271] “Gilliflowers thrive exceedingly there, and are very large. The collibuy, or humming-bird, is much pleased with them.”—_Josselyn’s Voyages_, p. 188.

[272] Elecampane (Gerard, p. 793),—_Inula Helenium_, L. “Roadsides” (1785),—_Cutler, l. c._; and now extensively naturalized in New England.

[273] Gerard, p. 1272,—_Rosa rubiginosa_, L.; and _R. micrantha_, Sm. Since naturalized, especially in Eastern New England, and not uncommon on roadsides and in pastures. First indicated as a member of our Flora by Bigelow in 1824.—_Fl. Bost., in loc._ “Eglantine, or sweet-bryer, is best sowen with juniper-berries,—two or three to one eglantine-berry, put into a hole made with a stick. The next year, separate and remove them to your banks. In three years’ time, they will make a hedge as high as a man; which you may keep thick and handsome with cutting.”—_Josselyn’s Voyages_, p. 188. And what next goes before seems to show that the author picked up this information here; which is not uninteresting.

[274] See p. 86.

[275] Brier-rose, or hep-tree (Gerard, p. 1270); “also called _Rosa canina_, which is a plant so common and well knowne, that it were to small purpose to use many words in the description thereof: for even children with great delight eat the berries thereof, when they be ripe,—make chaines and other prettie gewgawes of the fruit; cookes and gentlewomen make tarts, and such like dishes, for pleasure thereof,” &c. (Gerard, _l. c._). _Rosa canina_, L., was once the collective name of what are now understood as many distinct species; but that which still retains the name of dog-rose is reckoned the finest of native English roses. This familiar plant may well have been reared with tender interest in some New-England gardens of Josselyn’s day; but it did not make a new home here, like the eglantine. Cutler gives the name of dog-rose to the Carolina rose,—_R. Carolina_, L.,—which it has not kept; and he also makes it equivalent to the officinal _R. canina_. Our Flora will possibly one day include one or two other garden-roses. A damask rose is well established and spreading rapidly in mowing-land of the writer’s, and elsewhere on roadsides of this country; and that general favorite, the cinnamon-rose, which is now naturalized in England, may yet become wild with us.

[276] Great celandine (Gerard, p. 1069), as the west-country name of kenning-wort—that is, sight-wort—makes manifest; the juice being once thought to be “good to sharpen the sight,”—_Chelidonium majus_, L. Small celandine (_Ranunculus Ficaria_, L.) was quite another thing. The former had got to be “common by fences and amongst rubbish” in 1785 (Cutler, _l. c._), and is now naturalized in Eastern New England.

[277] Gerard, p. 650,—_Tanacetum vulgare_, L. In “pastures” (1785).—_Cutler, l. c._ Now widely naturalized in New England.

[278] See p. 57, note. “The ancient New-England standing dish” was doubtless far better than Gerard’s fried pompions (p. 921), and has more than held its own.