HISTORY OF CULTIVATED PLANTS. 133 



XIII. — Historical Notes on the Introduction of various 

 Plants into the Agriculture and Horticulture of 

 Tuscany : a summary of a work entitled Cenni storici sulla 

 introduzione di varie piante nelVagricoltura cd orticultura 

 Toscana. By Dr. Antonio Targioni-Tozzetti. Florence, 1850. 



The investigation of the origin and introduction of the vegetable 

 productions raised for the use of man, is not only an interesting 

 study in a critical, historical, or geographical point of vfew, but it 

 may be applied to practical use by the cultivator. In showing how 

 very few of these plants are to be met with naturally in the 

 state in which we grow them, and how by careful and persevering 

 cultivation, their natural properties have been modified, so as to 

 suit the purposes they are applied to, a stimulus is given to our 

 exertions in the still further improvement of those already 

 known, as well as for the introduction and conversion of new 

 species or varieties to the use of man. At the same time the 

 knowledge of the readiness with which, in some instances, a 

 worthless weed has been changed into a valuable esculent, and 

 of the lengthened period which has at other times been required 

 to effect the conversion, may often suggest to us the modus 

 ojyerandi to be attempted on future occasions. 



But this enquiry is often attended with no small difficulty. 

 However readily we may trace the process by which our European 

 cabbages and carrots, or apples and pears, have been received 

 into our gardens and orchards, and there made to produce the 

 luxuriant vegetables and fruits of modern days ; however 

 authentic may be the records of the introduction of the tobacco, 

 the potato, and other additions to our esculent, economical, or 

 ornamental plants, since the discovery of America, and the inven- 

 tion of printing, it is a very different matter to trace with any great 

 degree of plausibility the origin of the majority of tVie Cerealia 

 and fruits of more ancient cultivation, and which still supply so 

 important a part of our agricultural and horticultural productions. 

 Tradition ascribes "the East" as the source from whence many 

 of them sprung, and so much is this relied upon, that in all 

 cases where a plant, known to have been cultivated in early ages, 

 cannot now be found growing wild, there is a natural tendency 

 to assign as its probable native station some unknown district 

 among the mountains of Central Asia. It is indeed probable, 

 that the populous herbivorous nations which early occupied the 



