128. Citrouilles, the common summer squash, Cucurbita polymorpha, as may be seen by reference to Champlain's map of 1612, where its form is delineated over the inscription, la forme des sitroules. It is indigenous to America. Our word squash is derived from the Indian askutasquash or isquoutersquash. "In summer, when their corne is spent, Isquoutersquashes is their best bread, a fruit like the young Pumpion."—Wood's New England Prospect, 1634, Prince Society ed., p. 76. "Askutasquash, their Vine aples, which the English from them call Squashes, about the bignesse of Apples, of severall colours, a sweet, light, wholesome refreshing."—Roger Williams, Key, 1643, Narragansett Club ed., p. 125.
129. Courges, the pumpkin, Cucurbita maxima, indigenous to America. As the pumpkin and likewise the squash were vegetables hitherto unknown to Champlain, there was no French word by which he could accurately identify them. The names given to them were such as he thought would describe them to his countrymen more nearly than any others. Had he been a botanist, he would probably have given them new names.
130. Petum. Tobacco, Nicotiana rustica, sometimes called wild tobacco. It was a smaller and more hardy species than the Nicotiana tabacum, now cultivated in warmer climates, but had the same qualities though inferior in strength and aroma. It was found in cultivation by the Indians all along our coast and in Canada. Cartier observed it growing in Canada in 1535. Of it he says: "There groweth also a certain kind of herbe, whereof in Sommer they make a great prouision for all the yeere, making great account of it, and onely men vse of it, and first they cause it to be dried in the Sunne, then weare it about their neckes wrapped in a little beasts skinne made like a little bagge, with a hollow peece of stone or wood like a pipe; then when they please they make pouder of it, and then put it in one of the ends of the said Cornet or pipe, and laying a cole of fire vpon it, at the other ende sucke so long, that they fill their bodies full of smoke, till that it commeth out of their mouth and nostrils, euen as out of the Tonnell of a chimney. They say that this doth keepe them warme and in health: they neuer goe without some of it about them. We ourselues haue tryed the same smoke, and hauing put it in our mouthes, it seemed almost as hot as Pepper."—Jacques Cartier, 2 Voyage, 1535; Hakluyt, London, ed. 1810, Vol. III. p. 276.
We may here remark that the esculents found in cultivation at Saco, beans, squashes, pumpkins, and corn, as well as the tobacco, are all American tropical or subtropical plants, and must have been transmitted from tribe to tribe, from more southern climates. The Indian traditions would seem to indicate this. "They have a tradition," says Roger Williams, "that the Crow brought them at first an Indian Graine of Corne in one Eare, and an Indian or French Beane in another, from the Great God Kautantouwit's field in the Southwest from whence they hold came all their Corne and Beanes."— Key to the Language of America, London, 1643, Narragansett Club ed., p. 144.
Seventy years before Champlain, Jacques Cartier had found nearly the same vegetables cultivated by the Indians in the valley of the St. Lawrence. He says: "They digge their grounds with certaine peeces of wood, as bigge as halfe a sword, on which ground groweth their corne, which they call Ossici; it is as bigge as our small peason…. They haue also great store of Muske-milions. Pompions, Gourds, Cucumbers, Peason, and Beanes of euery colour, yet differing from ours."—Hakluyt, Vol. II. p. 276. For a full history of these plants, the reader is referred to the History of Plants, a learned and elaborate work now in press, by Charles Pickering, M.D. of Boston.
131. The latitude of Wood Island at the mouth of the Saco, where they were at anchor, is 43° 27' 23".
132. The site of this Indian fortification was a rocky bluff on the western side of the river, now owned by Mr. John Ward, where from time to time Indian relics have been found. The island at the mouth of the river, which Champlain speaks of as a suitable location for a fortress, is Ram Island, and is low and rocky, and about a hundred and fifty yards in length.
133. For Sunday read Tuesday.—Vide Shurtless's Calendar.
134. This landing was probably near Wells Neck, and the meadows which they saw were the salt marshes of Wells.
135. The Red-wing Blackbird, Ageloeus phoeniceus, of lustrous black, with the bend of the wing red. They are still abundant in the same locality, and indeed across the whole continent to the Pacific Ocean.—Vide Cones's Key, Boston, 1872, p. 156; Baird's Report, Washington, 1858, Part II. p. 526.