530 ANNUAL REPORT SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, 1925 



was rigrlit. Til order to forward his ends, lie caused his potato planta- 

 tion to be <^uarded bj' soldiers in full uniform throughout the day, 

 under the pretext of . preventing depredations ; but at night the 

 guard Avas Avithdrawn, Avhereupon a number of people, allured by the 

 attraction of forbidden fruit, came secretly to steal potatoes, to 

 plant them in their OAA'n gardens or to eat them. This was the very 

 object which the good Parmentier had in view. When the planta- 

 tion at Les Sablons Avas in full bloom Parmentier made a great 

 bouquet of potato blossoms which he carried to Versailles and pre- 

 sented to Louis XVI. The King placed one of the flowers in his 

 buttonhole, and in the evening Marie Antoinette appeared with a 

 cluster in her hair. This Avas sufficient. All the court followed the 

 example of their sovereigns. In graciously accepting Parmentier's 

 offering, the King said : " France Avill thank you some day fof hav- 

 ing found bread for the poor." 



No statue has been erected in Parmentier's honor, but on his graA^e 

 ill the cemetery of Pere Lachaise potatoes bloom each A'ear, showing 

 that he has not been forgotten by the j^eople of France. 



THE POTATO IN NORTH AMERICA 



Instead of having been taken from North America to Great 

 Britain and Ireland, as set forth in the myths regarding the "Vir- 

 ginia potato," Solamnn tiiberosuiii Avas first brought from Ireland to 

 North America, Avhere it is knoAvn as the " Irish potato." This hap- 

 pened in 1719, when a colony of Scotch-Irish immigrants established 

 a settlement at Londonderry, Rockingham County, N. H., bringing 

 Avith them potatoes and flax. Hazlett, in his history of Rockingham 

 County, gives the following account of this settlement : 



The first crops raised by the emigrants were potatoes and flax. Thoy had 

 brought their seed and sitinning wheels from Ireland and were the first to 

 cultivate the potato and manufacture linen In New England. They appear 

 to ha\'e cultivated land in common the summer after their arrival, as there is 

 a tract known by the name of the "Common Field," containing about 2% 

 acres and situated a few miles west of the dwelling house of Mr. Jonathan 

 Gate, in Derry. It was undoubtedly a clearing, and may have been an 

 abandoned planting ground of the Indians, who were gradually retiring to 

 deeper shades of the wilderness in the wilds of Canada.'" 



A more detailed description, with perhaps a flavor of romance, is 

 given by Parker in his " History of Londonderry." Describing the 

 arrival of the settlers of this toAvn, he says : 



They introduced the culture of the iiotato, whi(;li tlicy brought wUli thorn 

 from Ireland. Until their arrival, this valuable Aegetable, now regarded as 

 one of the necessities of life, if not Avholly unknown, was not cultivated in 

 New England. To them belongs the credit of its introduction to general use. 

 Although highly prized by this company of settlers, it was for a long time but 



"o Hazlett, Charles A. History of Rockingham County, N. II. Pago 506. 1915. 



