63 INTRODUCTION OF FOREIGN PLANTS. 
Introduction of Foreign Plants. 
“ A negro slave of the great Cortez,” says Humboldt, “ was 
the first who sowed wheat in New Spain. He found three 
grains of it among the rice which had been brought from Spain 
as food for the soldiers.” 
About twenty years ago, a Japanese forage plant, the Lespe- 
deza striata, whose seeds had been brought to the United 
States by some unknown accident, made its appearance in one 
of the Southern States. It spread spontaneously in various 
directions, and in a few years was widely diffused. It grows 
upon poor and exhausted soils, where the formation of a turf 
or sward by the ordinary grasses would be impossible, and 
where consequently no regular pastures or meadows can exist. 
It makes excellent fodder for stock, and though its value is 
contested, it is nevertheless generally thought a very important 
addition to the agricultural resources of the South.* 
In most of the Southern countries of Europe, the sheep and 
horned cattle winter on the plains, but in the summer are 
Every country has many plants not now, if ever, made use of by man, and 
therefore not designedly propagated by him, but which cluster around his 
dwelling, and continue to grow luxuriantly on the ruins of his rural habitation 
after he has abandoned it. The site of a cottage, the very foundation stones 
of which have been carried off, may often be recognized, years afterwards, by 
the rank weeds which cover it, though no others of the same species are found 
for miles. 
‘‘Medizval Catholicism,” says Vaupell, ‘‘ brought us the red horsehoof— 
whose reddish-brown flower buds shoot up from the ground when the snow 
melts, and are followed by the large leaves—comfrey and snake-root, which 
grow only where there were convents and other dwellings in the Middle Ages.” 
—Bigens Indvandring ¢ de Danske Skove, pp. 1, 2. 
* Accidents sometimes limit, as well as promote, the propagation of foreign 
vegetables in countries new to them. The Lombardy poplar is a dicecious 
tree, and is very easily grown from cuttings. In most of the countries into 
which it has been introduced the cuttings have been taken from the male, 
and as, consequently, males only have grown from them, the poplar does not 
produce seed in those regions. This is a fortunate circumstance, for other- 
wise this most worthless and least ornamental of trees would spread with a 
rapidity that would make it an annoyance to the agriculturist. 
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