360 THE SMALL FRUITS OF NEW YORK 



The botanists and herbalists of the sixteenth centiiry mention this 

 strawberry as a cultivated plant, and from time to time garden varieties 

 were introduced, such as the Apricot, Framboise, and Royal in France, 

 and the Black, Globe, and Prolific in England. In Germany, near Ham- 

 burg, a variety or varieties of F. moschata are still grown and much liked for 

 their rich flavor and musky odor, but are seldom profitable because of the 

 small size of the berries and unproductiveness of the plants. 



FRAG ARIA VIRIDIS 



This exceedingly variable species is now and probably has been culti- 

 vated for several centuries in Europe as a curiosity and somewhat for its 

 fruits, especially when hybridized with one of the two preceding species. It 

 is a very dwarf, densely hairy plant bearing small fruits none too delectable 

 in the pure species. It has been hybridized with F. vesca and F. moschata 

 to produce sorts grown in France and Germany. None of its offspring are 

 of garden importance now and it may be eliminated as a factor in the 

 improvement of the cviltivated strawberry of the future. It is much more 

 interesting in its botany, which the reader should look up on page 377, than 

 in its pomology. 



In studying the descriptions and illustrations of plant and fruit of 

 these three European strawberries one quickly comes to the conclusion 

 that none of them responds well to cultivation or to such selection as has 

 been practiced to secure better varieties. Cultivated sorts have differed 

 little from their wild prototypes. The strawberry, it would seem, could 

 never have reached great prominence as a cultivated fruit had all depend- 

 ence been placed on European species 



THE AMERICAN WILD, SCARLET, OR VIRGINIAN STRAWBERRY 



The commonest strawberry in North America, certainly in the eastern 

 part of the continent, is Fragaria virginiana and its botanical varieties 

 which pass under the common names wild strawberry, scarlet, and 

 Virginian strawberry. This is the common strawberry which was men- 

 tioned by the early European explorers and pioneers on our Atlantic 

 seaboard and is the wild strawberry of the fields and woods which has 

 given a delectable fruit to the inhabitants of eastern North America, 

 whether Indians or whites, during all time. 



In the seventeenth century this strawberry was taken to Europe, 

 the exact date, as recorded by Jean Rodin, gardener to Louis XIII, being 



