354 



Mock ^. ^ 



> J 



Gerard's Herlall, 1597. It was, moreover, used as a generic 

 name for the jDlant by Tournefort and was first published as such 

 in Adanson's Families des Plantes in 1763. However, Lin- 

 naeus had before this (in 1735) used the name as now generally 

 understood by botanists. The "Blew Pipe Tree" of Parkin- 

 son's Paradisus,' 1629, is our Syringa vulgaris, the common lilac. 

 His "Single White Pipe Tree" is Philadelphus coronarius, oi 

 which he says " the flowers . . . are of a strong, full, or 

 heady sent, not pleasing to a great many." Pipe or Pipe-tree 



"'""""_" ~ ' "the 



staks and branches thereof, when the pith is taken out, are 

 hollow like a pipe. 



Five columns of the Dictionary are occupied by the word 

 Potato with its combinations and derivatives. Dr. Murray, 

 judging from his letters, was perplexed 'by the statement appear- 

 ing in accounts of the introduction of the potato into this 

 country, that it was brought from Virginia. " It is generally 

 assumed to have been first brought by the remnant of Ealeigh's 

 ill-fated colonists, whom Drake picked up on his way home and 

 brought back to England in 1586. . . . But the question 

 is how these people who lived barely two years in Virginia 

 should have found or grown there a plant belonging to the very 

 antipodes of that part of t£e American continent. Moreover, 

 there is no later mention of the plant as cultivated there, the 

 plant there grown until about 1800 being the Sweet or Spanish 

 Potato (Batatas), called in America the Carolina P[otato], 

 while Solanuvi tuberosum was at first and still is largely known 

 as Irish Potato, from being- introduced bv Irish settlers at 



Londonderry, '^ew Hampshire, in 1719, whence its culture 

 gradually extended into other parts of the North American 

 colonies." Gerard cultivated the plant in 1596, but he was 

 m error m saying that he obtained it from Virginia. It first 

 reached Europe soon after 1580, bein^ introduced into Spain 

 from Quito. It spread from Spain into Italy about 1585, and 

 two years later was grown at Mons in Hainault. It soon 

 appeared m warlous continental Botanic Gardens, in'€luding 

 lireslau, where it was found in 1590. "The plant may have 

 been brought independently to Engfland .... but no con- 

 temporary statement associating Raleigh's name with the 

 potato has been found." 



An exhaustive treatment of the words Tea and Tobacco 

 would, as may be supposed, entail an enormous amount of 

 research, and of this the columns of the Dictionary bear ample 

 evidence. An enquiry addressed to Kew with regard to the 

 latter was : whether there is any connection between tobacco 

 tW -nT'^l ""^ *^" ^'l^J^^ Tobago?" The Dictionary states 

 or Tabfc," ''?,''' ^"'■'t ^^'' ^J^^^^^^ ^^'^ appellation of Tobago, 

 th.tof Tlv T-^ ;vhimsical notion that its form resembTed 



w^^kh thev Ir 1 Tll'^'^r^' '' ^^"^*1 ^y ^^^ Aborigines, with 

 winchthey inhaled the fumes of tobacco." ^ 



Jiuriay, the last m a letter dated June 9, 



