SOME OF THE POSSIBILITIES OF ECONOMIC BOTANY. 629 
fuberous enlargements filled with an excellent starch. Although the 
plant is of comparatively easy cultivation, efforts to introduce it into 
Kurope have not been successful, but it is said to have found favor in 
both the Indies, and may prove useful in our Southern States. 
(2) Ullucus or Ollucus, another tuberous-rooted plant from nearly 
the same region, but belonging to the beet or spinach family. It has 
produced tubers of good size in England, but they are too waxy in 
consistence to dispute the place of the better tubers of the potato. The 
plant is worth investigating for our hot, dry lands. 
(3) A tuber-bearing relative of our common hedge nettle, or Stachys, 
is now cultivated on a large scale at Crosnes, in France, for the Paris 
market. Its name in Paris is taken from the locality where it is now 
grown for use. Although its native country is Japan, it is called by 
some seedsmen Chinese artichoke. At the present stage of cultiva- 
tion the tubers are small and are rather hard to keep, but it is thought 
“that both of these defects can be overcome or evaded.”* Experi- 
ments indicate that we have in this species a valuable addition to our 
vegetables. We must next look at certain other neglected possibilities. 
Dr. Edward Palmer,t whose energy as a collector and acuteness as 
an observer are known to you all, has brought together very interest- 
* Gard. Chron., 1888. 
t Department of Agriculture Report for 1870, p. 404-428. Only those are here 
copied from Dr. Palmer’s list which he expressly states are extensively used. 
Ground nut (Apios tuberosa); Asculus Californica; Agave Americana; Nuphar ad- 
vena; prairie potato (Psoralea esculenta) ; Scirpus lacustris; Sagittaria variabilis: 
Kamass-root (Camassia esculenta) ; Solanum Fendleri (supposed by him to be the 
original of the cultivated potato); acorns of various sort; mesquit (Algarobia 
glandulosa); Juniperus occidentalis; nuts of Carya, Juglans, etc.; screw-bean 
(Strombocarpus pubescens) ; various cactacexw ; Yucca; cherries and many wild ber- 
ries; Chenopodium album., ete. Psoralea esculenta=prairie potato, or bread root. 
Palmer in Agricultural Report, 1870, p. 402. 
The following from Catlin, l. c. 1, p. 122: 
“Corn and dried meat are generally laid up in the fall in sufficient quantities to 
support them through the winter. These are the principal articles of food during 
that long and inclement season; and in addition to them, they oftentimes have in 
store great quantities of dried squashes, and dried ‘pommes blanches,’ a kind of 
turnip which grows in great abundance in those regions. - - - These are 
dried in great quantities and pounded into a sort of meal and cooked with dried 
meat and corn. Great quantities also are dried and laid away in store for the win- 
ter season, such as buffalo berries, service berries, strawberries, and wild plums. 
In addition to this we had the luxury of service berries without stint; and the 
buffalo bushes, which are peculiar to these northern regions, lined the banks of the 
river and the defiles in the blufts, sometimes for miles together, forming almost impass- 
able hedges, so loaded with the weight of their frvit that their boughs were seen 
every where gracefully bending down or resting on the ground. This last shrub (Shep- 
herdia), which may be said to be the most beautiful ornament that decks out the wild 
prairies, forms a striking contrast to the rest of the foliage, from the blue appear- 
ance of its leaves, by which it can be distinguished for miles in distance. The fruit 
which it produces in such incredible profusion, hanging in clusters to every limb 
and to every twig, is about the size of ordinary currants and not unlike them in 
