838 REVIEWS. 



1629, wrote from Salem, a few weeks after his arrival : " Here 

 are stores of pompions, cowcumbers, and other things of that 

 uature which I know not " (N. E. Plantation, 1G30) ; and, 

 again : " Vi^e abound with . . . sundry sorts of fruits, as 

 nmsk-nielons, water-melons, Indian pompions, Indian pease, 

 beans, and many other odd fruits that I cannot name " 

 (Young's Chron. of Mass., 265). William AVood, who was 

 in New England from 1629 to 1633, says of the Indians of 

 Massachusetts : " In summer, when their come is spent, 

 ' Isquoutersquashes ' is their best bread, a fruit like a young 

 Pumpion " (N. E. Prospect, p. 76). Roger Williams, 1643, 

 names these " Askiitasquash, their vine-apples, which the 

 English from them call squashes, about the bignesse of apples, 

 of several colors, a sweet, light, wholesome refreshing" 

 (Key to the Language of America, 103). Again, Josselyn 

 (1638-71, N. E. Rarities, 57) mentions these " squashes . . . 

 more truly Squontersquashes, a kind of melon or rather gourd, 

 for they oftentimes degenerate into gourds ; some of these 

 are green, some yellow, some longish like a gourd, others round 

 like an apple, all of them pleasant food boiled and buttered, 

 etc. But the best yellow squash, called an Apple squash, 

 because like an apple, and about the bigness of a Pome-water, 

 is the best kind : they are much eaten by the Indians and the 

 English." But he distinguishes these from the " Pompions 

 [of which] there be several kinds, some proper to the coun- 

 try ; they are dryer than our English Pompions, and better 

 tasted; you mcnj eat them green'' (p. 91). The last words 

 (here italicized) give a nearly literal translation of the 

 Algonkin-Indian name of Cucurbits, — in the dialect of New 

 England, " asq," plural " asquash," " green things," or (to be 

 eaten) " immature." Eliot, in his version of the Bible (1663) 

 names three kinds of asquash : askoot-asquash [ = Askiit- 

 asquash, R. Williams, Isquoutersquash-es of Wood, Squouter- 

 squash-es of Josselyn, ut supra], for "cucumbers"; quonoo- 

 asquash "gourds" [literally, " long ff.sg'?^^*/^ "] ; and monas- 

 koot-asquash " melons." 



Squashes were first known to the Dutch by their Al- 

 gonkin name. Van dor Donck, after speaking of the pump- 



