ix. This was in the waters of Massachusetts Bay, where Higginson

(New-Eng. Plantation, _l. c._, p. 120) also speaks of their being found. The question whether the oyster is an indigenous inhabitant of our bay, or only an introduced stranger, is considered by Dr. Gould (Report on Invert. Animals of Mass., pp. 135, 365).

[85] One of the fishes “in greatest request” among the Indians (p. 37). Wood says it “is as good as it is in England, and in great plenty in some places.”—_New-Eng. Prospect_, chap. ix.

[86] “The shads be bigger than the English shads, and fatter.”—_Wood_, _l. c._

[87] “_Taut-auog_ (sheep’s-heads).” So Roger Williams’s Key, _l. c._, p. 224. It is probable, therefore, that our author had the fish that we call tautog in his mind here. What is now called sheep’s-head is not known in Massachusetts Bay and northward.—_Storer_, _l. c._, p. 36.

[88] See p. 34; and Wood, _l. c._, chap. ix.

[89] See p. 96. It appears to be the mollusk, the shell of which is well known as the razor-shell (_Solen ensis_, L.).—_Gould_, _Report_, p. 28.

[90] See p. 32. “The sturgeons be all over the country; but the best catching of them is upon the shoals of Cape Cod and in the river of Merrimack, where much is taken, pickled, and brought to England. Some of these be 12, 14, and 18 feet long.”—_Wood_, _New-Eng. Prospect_, chap. ix. R. Williams says that “the natives, for the goodness and greatness of it, much prize it; and will neither furnish the English with so many, nor so cheap, that any great trade is like to be made of it, until the English themselves are fit to follow the fishing.”—_Key_, _l. c._, p. 224. It is one of Josselyn’s eight fish which are in “greatest request” with the Indians (p. 37). He calls “Pechipscut” River, in Maine, “famous for multitudes of mighty large sturgeon.”—_Voyages_, p. 204.

[91] See Voyages, pp. 105-6.

[92] “This fish is much used for bait to catch a cod, hacke, polluck, and the like sea-fish.”—_Voyages_, p. 107. It is still so used.

[93] Described at p. 95.

[94] See p. 34 of this, and p. 109 of the Voyages, where the author says, “Of sea-turtles, there are five sorts; of land-turtles, three sorts,—one of which is a right land-turtle, that seldom or never goes into the water; the other two being the river-turtle and the pond-turtle.”—See also the author’s observations on sea-turtles, at p. 39 of the Voyages.

[95] “Trouts there be good store in every brook; ordinarily two and twenty inches long. Their grease is good for the piles and clifts.”—_Voyages_, p. 110.

[96] See Storer’s Report, p. 146.

[97] See p. 35; and Voyages, p. 104. “The natives cut them in several parcel, and give and send them far and near for an acceptable present or dish.”—_R. Williams_, _Key_, _l. c._, p. 224.

[98] See Voyages, p. 110. This is the common sea-egg; _Echinus granulatus_, Say.—_Gould’s Rep._, p. 344.

[99] See p. 24 and note.

[100] Our author’s account of the fishes of New England may take this of old Wood (N. E. Prospect, _l. c._) for a tail-piece. “The chief fish for trade,” says he, “is a cod; but, for the use of the country, there is all manner of fish, as followeth:—

“The king of waters,—the sea-shouldering Whale; The snuffing Grampus, with the oily seal; The storm-presaging Porpus, Herring-hog; Line-shearing Shark, the Cat-fish, and Sea-dog; The scale-fenced Sturgeon; wry-mouthed Hollibut; The flouncing Salmon, Codfish, Greedigut; Cole, Haddick, Hake, the Thornback, and the Scate, (Whose slimy outside makes him seld’ in date;) The stately Bass, old Neptune’s fleeting post, That tides it out and in from sea to coast; Consorting Herrings, and the bony Shad; Big-bellied Alewives; Mackrels richly clad With rainbow-colour, the Frost-fish and the Smelt, As good as ever Lady Gustus felt; The spotted Lamprons; Eels; the Lamperies, That seek fresh-water brooks with Argus-eyes: These watery villagers, with thousands more, Do pass and repass near the verdant shore.”

[101] See p. 97.

[102] The account in the Voyages (pp. 114-23) is better; and Wood’s, in New-England’s Prospect, chap. xi. (to which last, Josselyn was possibly indebted), far better.

[103] See “the generating of these creatures,” in Voyages, p. 119. “Here, likewise,” says Wood, “be great store of frogs, which, in the spring, do chirp and whistle like a bird; and, at the latter end of summer, croak like our English frogs.”—_N. Eng. Prospect_, _l. c._ In his Voyages, Josselyn speaks (as Wood had done) of the tree-toad, and also of another kind of toad; and of “the eft, or swift, ... a most beautiful creature to look upon; being larger than ours, and painted with glorious colours: but I lik’d him never the better for it” (p. 119).

[104] Wood’s account (New-Eng. Prospect, _l. c._) is worth comparing with Higginson’s (New-England’s Plantation, _l. c._) and with Josselyn’s, both here and at pp. 23 and 114 of the Voyages. Wood justly says of this “most poisonous and dangerous creature,” that it is “nothing so bad as the report goes of him.... He is naturally,” he continues, “the most sleepy and unnimble creature that lives; never offering to leap or bite any man, if he be not trodden on first: and it is their desire, in hot weather, to lie in paths where the sun may shine on them; where they will sleep so soundly, that I have known four men to stride over them, and never awake her.... Five or six men,” he adds, “have been bitten by them; which, by using of snake-weed” (compare the preface to this, p. 119), “were all cured; never any yet losing his life by them. Cows have been bitten; but, being cut in divers places, and this weed thrust into their flesh, were cured. I never heard of any beast that was yet lost by any of them, saving one mare” (_l. c._). Of other serpents, Wood mentions the black snake; and Josselyn, in his Voyages (_l. c._), speaks of “infinite numbers, of various colours;” and especially of “one sort that exceeds all the rest; and that is the checkquered snake, having as many colours within the checkquers shadowing one another as there are in a rainbow.” He says again, “The water-snake will be as big about the belly as the calf of a man’s leg” which is, perhaps, the water-adder. Josselyn adds, “I never heard of any mischief that snakes did” (_l. c._); and so Wood: “Neither doth any other kind of snakes” (the rattle-snake always excepted, as no doubt dangerous when trodden on) “molest either man or beast.” There are perhaps no worse prejudices in common life, than those which breed cruelty. In the Voyages (p. 23), our author makes mention “of a sea-serpent, or snake, that lay quoiled up like a cable upon a rock at Cape Ann. A boat passing by with English aboard, and two Indians, they would have shot the serpent: but the Indians disswaded them; saying, that, if he were not kill’d outright, they would be all in danger of their lives.” This was from “some neighbouring gentlemen in our house, who came to welcome me into the countrey;” and it seems, that, “amongst variety of discourse, they told me also of a young lyon (not long before) killed at Piscataway by an Indian;” which, indeed, was possibly not without foundation. And as to the serpent, compare a Report of a Committee of the Linnæan Society of New England relative to a large marine animal, supposed to be a serpent, seen near Cape Ann, Mass., in August, 1817 (Boston, 1817); which contains also a full account of a smaller animal—supposed not to differ, even in species, from the large—which was taken on the rocks of Cape Ann.—See also Storer, Report on the Reptiles of Mass.; Supplement, p. 410.

[105] The author continues his entomological observations, in his Voyages, p. 115; and the account is fuller than Wood’s; _New-England’s Prospect_, chap. xi.

[106] Gerard by Johnson, p. 17,—_Carex flava_, L.; the first species of this genus indicated in North America, and common also to Europe. There is no doubt of the reference, taking Josselyn’s name to be meant for specific, and to refer to Gerard’s first figure with the same name. But it is certainly possible that our author had in view only a general reference to Gerard’s fourteenth chapter, “Of Hedgehog Grasse,” which brings together plants of very different genera; and, in this case, his name is of little account. Cutler (Account of Indig. Veg., _l. c._, 1785) mentions three genera of _Cyperaceæ_, but not _Carex_; nor did he ever publish that description of our true _Gramineæ_ “and other native grasses,” which, he says (_l. c._, p. 407), “may be the subject of another paper.” The first edition of Bigelow’s Florula Bostoniensis (1814) has seven species of _Carex_, which are increased to seventeen in the second edition (1824); the list embracing the most common and conspicuous forms. The genus has since been made an object of special study, and the number of our species, in consequence, greatly increased. A list of Carices of the neighborhood of Boston, published by the present writer in 1841 (Hovey’s Mag. Hort.), gives forty-seven species; and Professor Dewey’s Report on the Herbaceous Plants of Massachusetts, in 1840, reckons ninety-one species within the limits of his work.

[107] Johnson’s Gerard, p. 42,—English matweed, or helme (the other species being excluded, as not English, by our author’s caption); which I take to be _Calamagrostis arenaria_ (L.) Roth, of Gray, Man., p. 548; called sea-matweed in England, and common to Europe and America. But if the author only intended to refer to Gerard’s “Chapter 34, of Mat-weed,”—which is perhaps, on the whole, unlikely,—his name is of no value.

[108] Gerard, p. 46,—_Typha latifolia_, L.,—common to America and Europe.

[109] Gerard, p. 47,—_Stellaria graminea_, L.; for which our author mistook, as did Cutler a century after, the nearly akin _S. longifolia_, Muhl.

[110] Appears not to be meant for a specific reference to any of Gerard’s species; but only an indication of the genus, with the single distinguishing character of color, which was enough to separate the New-England plants from the only British one referred by Gerard to Iris. Both of our blue-flags are peculiar to the country.

[111] Not one of Gerard’s bastard daffodils, but his dog’s-tooth, p. 204 (_Erythronium_, L.). Our common dog’s-tooth was at first taken for a variety of the European, but is now reckoned distinct.

[112] Gerard, p. 205,—_Orchis_, L., etc. It is here clear that the name is used only in a general way. The second name (_Satyrion_), perhaps, however, makes our author’s notion a little more definite, and permits us to refer the plants he had probably in view to species of _Platanthera_, Rich. (Gray, Man., p. 444), of which only one is certainly known to be common to us and Europe.

[113] Gerard, em. p. 257,—_Nasturtium officinale_, L. Reckoned also by Cutler, and indeed naturalized in some parts of the country (Gray, Man., p. 30); but our author had probably _N. palustre_, DC. (marsh-cress), if any thing of this genus, and not rather _Cardamine hirsuta_, L. (hairy lady’s smock), in his mind. Both the last are common to us and Europe.—_Gray_, _l. c._

[114] Gerard, p. 192. _Lilium bulbiferum_ (the garden red lily) is meant; for which our author mistook our own red lily (_L. Philadelphicum_, L.).

[115] Of the two plants,—either of which may possibly have been in view of the author here,—the sorrell du bois, or white wood-sorrel of Gerard, p. 1101 (_Oxalis acetosella_, L.) which is truly common to Europe and America, and the sheep’s sorrel (Gerard, p. 397,—_Rumex acetosella_, L.), which inhabits, indeed, the whole northern hemisphere, but is taken by Dr. Gray to be a naturalized weed here, I incline to think the latter less likely to have escaped Josselyn’s attention than the former, and to be what he means to say appeared to him as native, in 1671. For the yellow wood-sorrel, see farther on.

[116] Gerard, em., p. 404,—_Ophioglossum vulgatum_, L.; common to us and Europe.

[117] Gerard, em., p. 409,—_Smilacina bifolia_ (L.), Ker; common to us and Europe.

[118] Gerard, em., p. 410. A mistake of our author’s, which can hardly be set right. The station is against the plant’s having been _Smilacina trifolia_ (L.), Desf. But it may be that _Clintonia borealis_ (Ait.) Raf., was intended.

[119] _Alisma plantago_, L., common to Europe and America; “called, in New England, water suck-leaves and scurvie-leaves. You must lay them whole to the leggs to draw out water between the skin and the flesh.”—_Josselyn’s Voyages_, p. 80. As to its medicinal properties, see Gerard, p. 419; and Wood and Bache, Dispens., p. 1293.

[120] _Plantago maritima_, L. (Gerard, p. 423), a native of Europe and America, is our only sea-plantain. One of the others was probably _Triglochin_.

[121] _Sagittaria sagittifolia_, L. (now called arrowhead), common to Europe and America; though here passing into some varieties which are unknown in the European Floras.

[122] _Gentiana saponaria_, L., peculiar to America, but nearly akin to the European _G. pneumonanthe_, L., which our author intended.—_Johnson’s Gerard_, _edit. cit._, p. 438.

[123] The plant is green hellebore (_Veratrum viride_, Ait.); so near, indeed, to the white hellebore (_V. album_, L.) of Europe, that it was taken for it by Michaux. In his Voyages, the author, after speaking of the use of opium by the Turks, says, “The English in New England take white hellebore, which operates as fairly with them as with the Indians,” &c. (p. 60); and see p. 76, further.

[124] _Polygonum lapathifolium_, L. (_Hydropiper_ of Gerard, p. 445),—for which, perhaps, _P. hydropiper_, L., was mistaken,—and _P. Persicaria_, L. (_Persicaria maculosa_ of Gerard, _l. c._), are what the author means; being the two sorts figured by Gerard himself. The third, added by Johnson, is unknown in this country; and the fourth belongs to a very different genus. _P. Persicaria_ is marked as introduced in the late Mr. Oakes’s catalogue of the plants of Vermont; and both this and _P. hydropiper_ are considered to be naturalized weeds by Dr. Gray (Man., p. 373). Josselyn’s testimony as to the former, as appearing to him to be native in 1671, is therefore not without interest; and possibly it is not quite worthless as to the latter.

[125] _Chamæsyce_, or spurge-time, of Gerard (_edit. cit._, p. 504), is _Euphorbia chamæsyce_, L., a species belonging to the Eastern continent; for which Sloane (_cit. L. Sp. Pl. in loco_) appears to have mistaken our _Euphorbia maculata_, L.; while Plukenet (_Alm. 372_, _cit. L._) recognizes the affinity of the same plants, calling the latter _Chamæsyce altera Virginiana_. Josselyn’s spurge-time may be _E. maculata_; but quite possibly, taking the station which he gives into the account, _E. polygonifolia_, L.

[126] There are “several sorts of spurge,” according to the Voyages (p. 78); of which this, which I cannot specifically refer, is possibly one.

[127] To this species of _Saxifraga_, L., unknown to our _Flora_ (Gerard, p. 528), our author, with little doubt, referred the pretty _S. Virginiensis_, Michx.—See p. 58 of this, note.

[128] Gerard, em., p. 535,—_Salicornia herbacea_, L. But Linnæus referred one of Clayton’s Virginia specimens (the rest he did not distinguish from _S. herbacea_) to a variety, _β. Virginica_ (which he took to be also European; _Sp. Pl._), and afterwards raised this to a species, as _S. Virginica_, _Syst. Nat._, vol. ii. p. 52, Willd. _Sp. Pl._, vol. i. p. 25. To this the more common glasswort of our salt marshes is to be referred; and we possess, beside, a still better representative of the European plant in _S. mucronata_, Bigel. (_Fl. Bost._, edit. 2, p. 2), which may perhaps best be taken for a peculiar variety (_S. herbacea_, _β. mucronata_, articulorum dentibus squamisque mucronatis, _Enum. Pl. Cantab._, Ms.; and _S. Virginica_ may well be another) of a species common to us and Europe. It is certain that we have plants strictly common to American and European Floras, in which the differences referable to difference of atmospheric and other like conditions are either not apparent or of no account; and it is possible that there are yet other species, now considered peculiar to America, which only differ from older European species in those characters—whether of exuberance mostly, or also of impoverishment—in which an American variety of a plant, common to America and Europe, might beforehand be expected to differ from an European state of the same. “Linnæus ut Tournefortii errores corrigeret, varietates nimis contraxit.”—_Link_, _Phil. Bot._, p. 222.

[129] _Hypericum perforatum_, L. (“_Hypericum_, _S. John’s-wort_; in shops, _Perforata_.”—_Gerard_, _edit. cit._, p. 539). The species is considered to have been introduced, by most American authors; and it is possible that Josselyn had _H. corymbosum_, Muhl., in his mind.

[130] _Hypericum quadrangulum_, L. (Gerard, p. 542); for which our author doubtless mistook _H. mutilum_, L. (_H. parviflorum_, Willd.), a species peculiar to America; to which Cutler’s _H. quadrangulum_ (Account of Indig. Veg., _l. c._, p. 474) is probably also to be referred.

[131] _Veronica arvensis_, L. (Gerard, p. 613),—a native, at present, of Europe, Asia, Northern Africa, and North America (Benth., in DC. Prodr., vol. x. p. 482); but considered to have been introduced here.

[132] _Veronica_, L. The species is perhaps _V. officinalis_, L.; which, together with _V. serpyllifolia_, L., is considered by Prof. Gray to be both indigenous and introduced here.—_Man. Bot._, pp. 200-1.

[133] _Hedeoma pulegioides_ (L.) Pers. (American pennyroyal), is doubtless meant. The specific name indicates its resemblance—in smell and taste particularly—to _Mentha pulegium_, L.; for which our author and Cutler (_l. c._, p. 461) mistook it. But the former is peculiar to America.

[134] _Mentha aquatica_, L. _Sp. Pl._ (Gerard, p. 684); for which it is likely our author (and also Cutler, _l. c._, p. 460) mistook _M. Canadensis_, L., Gray.

[135] _Nepeta cataria_, L. (Gerard, em., p. 682); considered by American botanists to have been introduced from Europe.

[136] _Agrimonia Eupatoria_, L. (Gerard, em., p. 712); common to America and Europe.

[137] _Xanthium strumarium_, L., Gray (Gerard, p. 809); common, as a species, to both continents; but in part, also, introduced.—_Gray_, _Man._, p. 212.

[138] _Nuphar advena_, Ait.,—the common American species,—is meant; and this, though resembling _N. lutea_, Sm., of Europe, is distinct from it.

[139] _Arum_, L. (Gerard, p. 381). The New-England species “differ,” as our author says, “from all the kinds” in the Old World.

[140] None of the species, presumably here meant, are common to America and Europe. Our author’s white violet is _Viola blanda_, Willd.

[141] All our true honeysuckles (“woodbinde, or honisuckles,”—Gerard, p. 891; _Caprifolium_, Juss.) are distinct from those of Europe; but what the author meant here is uncertain.

[142] _Convallaria_, L.; _Polygonatum_, Tourn.; _Smilacina_, Desf. Many botanists have referred our smaller Solomon’s seal to the nearly akin _C. multiflora_ of Europe; but Dr. Gray (Manual, p. 466) pronounces the former a distinct American species. The second of Josselyn’s species is the “_Polygonatum Virginianum_, or Virginian’s Salomon’s seale” of Johnson’s Gerard (p. 905), and also of Morison (Hist., _cit. L._), and earliest described and figured by Cornuti as _P. Canadense, &c._, which is _Smilacina stellata_, (L.) Desf.; peculiar to America. The third is set down by our author, at p. 56, among the “plants proper to the country;” and Wood (New-Eng. Prospect, chap. v.) mentions it among eatable wild fruits, by the same name. It is probably _Smilacina racemosa_, (L.) Desf.,—a suggestion which I owe to my friend Rev. J. L. Russell’s notes upon Josselyn’s plants, in Hovey’s Magazine (March, April, and May, 1858); papers which were published after the manuscript of this edition had passed from the hands of the editor,—and is also confined to this continent.

[143] _Geranium_, L. The first is _G. Carolinianum_, L., which nearly resembles Gerard’s dove’s-foot (p. 938); the second is _G. Robertianum_, L., common to us and Europe; and the third (Gerard, p. 940)—which cannot be _G. dissectum_—was meant, it is likely to be taken for synonymous with the fourth, or raven’s-claw,—doubtless our lovely _G. maculatum_, L., which belongs to that group of species which the old botanists distinguished by the common name _Geranium batrachioides_, or crow-foot geranium, which flowers in May, and is of well-known value in medicine; and the “knobby” root, attributed to Josselyn’s third kind, favors this opinion.

[144] The genus _Potentilla_, L., in general, is perhaps intended by cinque-foil; and although our author probably confounded the common and variable _Potentilla Canadensis_, L., with the nearly akin _P. reptans_ and _P. verna_, L., of Europe, yet the larger part of our New-England species are, with little doubt, common to both continents. What Josselyn referred to _Tormentilla_, L.,—a genus not now separated from _Potentilla_,—was probably a state of _P. Canadensis_, which resembles _P. reptans_, L., as remarked above (and was, indeed, mistaken for it by Cutler,—_l. c._, p. 453), as this does _Tormentilla reptans_, L.

[145] _Geum strictum_, Ait.,—not found in England, but European (Gray, Man., p. 116),—is indicated by the author’s phrase; and see the Voyages, p. 78, for his opinion of its medicinal virtue.

[146] _Fragaria vesca_, L. (the common wood-strawberry of Europe), is native here, according to Oakes (Catal. Verm., p. 12), “especially on mountains;” and I have even gathered it, but possibly naturalized, on the woody banks of Fresh Pond in Cambridge. Our more common strawberry was not separated from the European by Linnæus, but is now reckoned a distinct species. “There is likewise strawberries in abundance,” says Wood (New-England’s Prospect, _l. c._),—“very large ones; some being two inches about. One may gather half a bushel in a forenoon.”—“This berry,” says Roger Williams (Key, in Hist. Coll., vol. iii. p. 221), “is the wonder of all the fruits growing naturally in those parts. It is of itself excellent; so that one of the chiefest doctors of England was wont to say, that God could have made, but God never did make, a better berry. In some parts, where the natives have planted, I have many times seen as many as would fill a good ship, within few miles’ compass. The Indians bruise them in a mortar, and mix them with meal, and make strawberry-bread.” Gookin also speaks of Indian-bread.—_Mass. Hist. Coll._, vol. i. p. 150.

[147] The two plants here intended, and supposed by the author to correspond with the “wild angelica” and “great wilde angelica” of Gerard (pp. 999-1000), may perhaps be taken for the same which Cornuti (_Canad. Pl. Hist._, pp. 196-200), thirty years before, had designated as new,—Josselyn’s _Angelica sylvestris minor_ being _Angelica lucida Canadensis_ of Cornuti, which is _A. lucida_, L. (and probably, as the French botanist describes the fruit as “minus foliacea vulgaribus,” also _Archangelica peregrina_, Nutt.); and his _Angelica sylvestris major_ being _A. atropurpurea Canadensis_ of Cornuti, or _A. atropurpurea_, L.

[148] _Smyrnium aureum_, L. (golden Alexanders), now separated from that genus, was mistaken, it is quite likely, for _S. olusatrum_, L. (true Alexanders), to which it bears a considerable resemblance.—_Gerard_, p. 1019.

[149] _Achillea millefolium_, L. Oakes has marked this as introduced (Catal. Vermont, p. 17): but it appeared to our author, in 1672, to be indigenous; and Dr. Gray reckons it among plants common to both hemispheres.—_Statistics of Amer. Flora_, in Am. Jour. Sci., vol. xxiii. p. 70. The author’s reference is to common yarrow.—_Gerard_, p. 1072.

[150] _Aquilegia Canadensis_, L. As elsewhere, the author probably means here only that the genus is common to both continents.

[151] At p. 56, both of these are set down among the “plants proper to the country.” The first, to follow Gerard (p. 1108), is _Chenopodium botrys_, L.,—a native of the south of Europe, and considered as an introduced species here. It has reputation in diseases of the chest.—Wood & Bache, Dispens., p. 213. Josselyn’s oak of Cappadocia (Gerard, p. 1108) is an American species,—_Ambrosia elatior_, L. Cutler says of it (_l. c._, p. 489), “It has somewhat the smell of camphire. It is used in antiseptick fomentations.”

[152] _Galium aparine_, L. (Gerard, _edit. cit._, p. 1122), common to America and Europe.—Compare Gray, Man., p. 170.

[153] The “Filix mas, or male ferne,” of Gerard, _edit. cit._, p. 1128 (for, says he, of the “divers sorts of ferne ... there be two sorts, according to the old writers,—the male and the female; and these be properly called ferne: the others have their proper names”), is the collective designation of four species of _Aspidium_; of which all, according to Pursh, and certainly three, are natives of both continents,—_AA. cristatum_, _Filix mas_, _Filix fæmina_, and _aculeatum_, Willd. “_Filix fæmina_ (female ferne, or brakes,)” of Gerard, _l. c._ is _Pteris aquilina_, L.; also common to us and Europe. The other _Filices_ mentioned by our author are _Ophioglossum vulgatum_, L. (p. 42); and _Adiantum pedatum_, L. (p. 55).

[154] _Oxalis corniculata_, L. (Gerard, em., p. 1202), common to Europe and America.

[155] _Ulmus_, L. There are no species common to America and Europe.

[156] See the Voyages, p. 69, where the author has it “the line-tree, with long nuts: the other kind I could never find.” The former was _Tilia Americana_, L.,—a species peculiar to America.

[157] See p. 48; and Voyages, p. 69. None of our species are found in Europe.

[158] The plant intended is doubtless the same with that spoken of in the Voyages, p. 80.—“_Rosa solis_, sundew, moor-grass. This plant I have seen more of than ever I saw in my whole life before in England,” &c. Both our common New-England species of _Drosera_ are also natives of Europe.

[159] “Differing much from those in England. One sort of them bears a most beautiful flower” (p. 56, where it is rightly placed among plants “proper to the country”). The author refers here, doubtless, to _Apios tuberosa_, Moench. (ground-nut of New England), which was raised at Paris, from American seeds, by Vespasian Robin, and figured from his specimens by Cornuti (Canad., p. 200) in 1635; but it was celebrated, ten years earlier, in “Nova Anglia,”—a curious poem by the Rev. William Morrell, who came over with Capt. Robert Gorges in 1623, and spent about a year at Weymouth and Plymouth, publishing his book in 1625 (repr. Hist. Coll., vol. i. p. 125, &c.),—as follows:—

“Vimine gramineo nux subterranea suavis Serpit humi, tenui flavo sub cortice, pingui Et placido nucleo nivei candoris ab intra, Melliflua parcos hilarans dulcedine gustus, Donec in æstivum Phœbus conscenderit axem. His nucleis laute versutus vescitur Indus: His exempta fames segnis nostratibus omnis Dulcibus his vires revocantur victibus almæ.”

[160] See p. 52 and Voyages (pp. 70, 81) for other notices of _Fungi_; and Voyages, p. 81, for the only mention of _Algæ_.

[161] 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.

[162] _Hepatica triloba_, Chaix. (_Anemone hepatica_, L.), common to Europe and America; occurring occasionally with white flowers.—_Gerard_, em., p. 1203.

[163] _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.

[164] 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.

[165] _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.

[166] 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.

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

[168] 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.

[169] _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.”

[170] _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.

[171] _Salix_, L.; the genus only meant here, it is likely.

[172] _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.

[173] _Myrica Gale_, L. (Gerard, p. 1414); common to Europe and America.

[174] _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.

[175] “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.

[176] _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.

[177] _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).

[178] _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.”

[179] _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._

[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.

[279] “For such commodities as lie under ground, I cannot, out of mine own experience or knowledge, say much; having taken no great notice of such things: but it is certainly reported that there is iron-stone; and the Indians informed us that they can lead us to the mountains of black-lead; and have shown us lead-ore, if our small judgment in such things does not deceive us; and though nobody dare confidently conclude, yet dare they not utterly deny, but that the Spaniard’s-bliss may lie hid in the barren mountains. Such as have coasted the country affirm that they know where to fetch sea-coal, if wood were scarce. There is plenty of stone, both rough and smooth, useful for many things; with quarries of slate, out of which they get coverings for houses; with good clay, whereof they make tiles and bricks and pavements for their necessary uses. For the country it is well watered as any land under the sun; every family, or every two families, having a spring of sweet water betwixt them; which is far different from the waters of England, being not so sharp, but of a fatter substance, and of a more jetty colour.... Those that drink it be as healthful, fresh, and lusty as they that drink beer.”—_Wood, New-Eng. Prospect_, chap. v. “The humour and justness of” this writer’s “account recommend him,” says the editor of 1764, “to every candid mind.” There is certainly no view of New England, as it was at its settlement, that surpasses Wood’s in understanding, and homeborn English truth, not always without beauty. What he says in this place of “quarries of slate” points to a very early discovery. Higginson says, in 1629 (New-Eng. Plantation, _l. c._, p. 118), “Here is plenty of slates at the Isle of Slate in Masathulets Bay:” and there is a court order of July 2, 1633, granting “to Tho: Lambe, of slate in Slate Ileand, 10 poole towards the water-side, and 5 poole into the land, for three yeares; payeing the yearely rent of ijs. vjd.”—_Mass. Col. Rec._, vol. i. p. 106. There are other later grants of the same island, which “lies between Bumkin Island and Weymouth River.”—_Pemberton, Desc. Bost., Mass. Hist. Coll._, vol. iii. p. 297. Josselyn, in his Voyages, p. 46, says that tables of slate could be got out (he does not tell us where), “long enough for a dozen men to sit at.” Argillaceous slate is, according to Dr. Hitchcock, “the predominating rock on the outermost of these islands;” and he adds, that “there can be but little doubt that the peninsula of Boston has a foundation” of this rock.—_Report on Geol. of Mass._, p. 270.

[280] “Mr. John Winthrope, jun., is granted y^e hill at Tantousq, about 60 miles westward, in which the black-leade is; and liberty to purchase some land there of the Indians” (13th November, 1644).—_Mass. Col. Rec._, vol. ii. p. 82; and _Savage, in Winthrop, N. E._, vol. ii. p. 213, note. The place mentioned is what is now Sturbridge; which is called “the most important locality” of black-lead in Massachusetts, by Dr. Hitchcock.—_Geol._, pp. 47, 395.

[281] “The mountains and rocky hills are richly furnished with mines of lead, silver, copper, tin, and divers sorts of minerals, branching out even to their summits; where, in small crannies, you may meet with threds of perfect silver: yet have the English no maw to open any of them;” and so forth.—_Josselyn’s Voyages_, p. 44.

[282] _Asterias rubens_, L.—_Gould, Report on Invert._, p. 345.

[283] See the chapter on Fishes, p. 23, for this and the others here spoken of.

[284] “Numerous about the Isle of Sables; i.e., the Sandy Isle.”—_Voyages_, p. 106. “Mr. Graves” (year 1635) “in the ‘James,’ and Mr. Hodges in the ‘Rebecka,’ set sail for the Isle of Sable for sea-horse, which are there in great number,” &c.—_Winthrop’s N. E., by Savage_, vol. i. p. 162. And I cite one other mention of this pursuit: “Eastward is the Isle of Sables; whither one John Webb, _alias_ Evered (an active man), with his company, are gone, with commission from the Bay to get sea-horse teeth and oyle.”—_Lechford’s Newes from New England_ (1642), _Mass. Hist. Coll._, vol. iii. 3d series, p. 100. The Magdalen Islands, in the Gulf of St. Lawrence, are the most southern habitat of the animal spoken of by Godman.—_Amer. Nat. Hist._, vol. i. p. 249.

[285] Compare Cutler (Account of Indig. Veg., _l. c._, p. 456) and Wood and Bache (Dispens., p. 1369).

[286] The author has something to the same effect in his Voyages, p. 124; but Wood’s account of the Indian women (New-England’s Prospect,