212 STURTEVANT S NOTES ON EDIBLE PLANTS 



A subvariety, the Ptiritan,' answers to Beverley's* description of a form which he calls 

 Cushaw, an Indian name recognizable in the Ecushaw of Hariot, 1586. This form was 

 grown at the New York Agricultural Experiment Station in 1884 from seed obtained from 

 the Seminoles of Florida and appears synonymous with the Neapolitan, to which Vilmorin 

 applies the French synonym, courge de la Florida. 



C. pepo Lirm. gourd, pumpkin, squash. 



The Squash. 



Nativity undetermined. The word " squash " seems to have been derived from 

 the American aborigines and in particular from those tribes occupying the northeastern 

 Atlantic coast. It seems to have been originally applied to the summer squash. Roger 

 Williams' writes the word " askutasquash," "their vine apples, which the English 

 from them call squashes; about the bigness of apples, of several colors." Josselyn ^ gives 

 another form to the-word, writing, " squashes," " but more truly ' squoutersquashes,' a 

 kind of mellon or rather gourd, for they sometimes degenerate into gourds. Some of 

 these are green, some yellow, some longish, like a gourd; others rotmd, like an apple; all 

 of them pleasant food boy led and buttered, and seasoned with spice. But the yellow 

 squash called an apple squash (because like an apple), and about the bigness of a pome 

 water is the best kind." This apple squash, by name at least, as also by the descrip- 

 tion so far as applicable, is even now known to culture but is rarely grown on accoimt 

 of its small size.* 



Van der Donck, after speaking of the pumpkins of New Netherlands, 1642-33, adds: 

 " The natives have another species of this vegetable peculiar to themselves, called by 

 our people quaasiens, a name derived from the aborignes, as the plant was not known to 

 us before our intercourse with them. It is a delightftd fruit, as well to the eye on account 

 of its fine variety of colors, as to the mouth for its agreeable taste. ... It is gathered 

 in simmier, and when it is planted in the middle of April, the fruit is fit for eating by the 

 first of June. They do not wait for it to ripen before making use of the fruit, but only 

 until it has attained a certain size. They gather the squashes, and immediately place 

 them on the fire without any fiuther trouble." * In 1683, Worlidge uses the word squash, 

 saying: " There are lesser sorts of them (pompeons) that are lately brought into request 

 that are called ' squashes,' the edible fruit whereof, boyled and serv'd up with powdered 

 beef is esteemed a good sawce." Kalm,' in his Travels, says distinctly: " The squashes 

 of the Indians, which now are cultivated by Europeans, belong to those kind of goiu-ds 

 which ripen before any other." These squashes of New England were apparently called 

 " sitroules " by Champlain,' 1605, who describes them " as big as the fist." Lahon- 



'Burr, F. Field, Card. Veg. 221. 1863. 



Beverley ffij/. Fa. 124. 1705. 



Williams, R. JTey. 1643. Narragansett Ed. 1:125. 1866. 



* Josselyn, J. New Eng. Rar. 109. 1865. Orig. 1672. 

 ' Burr, F. Field, Card. Veg. 207. 1863. 



Gray, A. Amer. Journ. Sci. 377. 1883. 

 ' Kalm, P. Trat. No. Amer. 1:110. 1772. 

 Champlain Voy. Prince Soc. Ed. 2:64, 75. 1878. 



