Th: ee AUTE M A tio See ee Gn 
1901 | Parish, — Vegetation of Plymouth 17 
Museum at Paris. Although the specimen lacks the lower leaves 
there can be no doubt whatever that it is Brassica nigra and that it 
bears the original label of Fournier. Furthermore the specimen cor- 
responds so closely to the description of S. xtagarense that there can 
be no reason to suspect a confusion of specimens and labels. The 
name S. ziagarense, Fourn., may, therefore, be transferred from the 
synonymy of S. oficinale, L., to that of Brassica nigra, Koch, and 
one more question mark, of some years' standing, may thus be elimi- 
nated from American systematic botany. — B. L. ROBINSON. 
THE VEGETATION OF PLYMOUTH THREE HUNDRED YEARS AGO. — 
In the Rev. Alexander Young's * Chronicles of the Pilgrim Fathers 
from 1602-1625 " there is a short account of the natural productions 
of the Plymouth shore. The vegetation is thus described : 
«The land for the crust of the earth is a spit's depth, excellent 
black mould, and fat in some places; and vines everywhere, cherry- 
trees, plum-trees, and many others which we know not. Many kinds 
of herbs we found here in the winter, as strawberry leaves innumer- 
able, sorrel, yarrow, carval, brooklime, liverwort, water-cresses, great 
store of leek and onions, and an excellent kind of flax or hemp." 
Only three of the plants mentioned seem to require comment. 
What plant is intended by *carval" I do not know. Possibly the 
word is a variant of “ carvies," said to be a vernacular name for Car- 
um Carui, L. If this be the case the observer must have mistaken 
some indigenous Umbellifer for the European species, as he might 
easily do. It seems less probable that he could have failed to recog- 
nize two such familiar herbs as sorrel and water-cress, or have in- 
tended by those names any other plants than Rumex Acetosella, L., 
and Nasturtium officinale, R. Br. 
Yet botanists agree in considering both as introduced species in 
North America. This testimony throws the date of the introduction 
very far back. When and by what means had they migrated, that the 
Pilgrims should find them already in possession of the virgin soil? 
It appears probable that some curious and useful information 
concerning the primeval vegetation of the Atlantic coast might be 
gleaned from the accounts of contemporary writers. But this research, 
perhaps, may already have been made.— S. B. Parisu, San Bernardino, 
California. 
