[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.
[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.