298 sturtevant's notes on edible plants 



Hancomia speciosa Gomez. Apocynaceae. mangaba. 



Biazil. Gardner ' says the fruit is about the size of a large plum, streaked a little 

 with red on one side. The flavor is most delicious. Hartt " says the fruit is very delicious. 



Hedysarum mackenzii Richards. Leguminosae. licorice-root. 



North America. Richardson ' says at Fort Good Hope, Mackenzie River, this plant 

 furnishes long, flexible roots which taste sweet like licorice and are much eaten in the 

 spring by the natives but become woody and lose their juiciness and crispness as the season 

 advances. This is the licorice-root of the trappers of the Northwest and is also used as 

 a food by the Indians of Alaska.^ 



Heldreichia kotschjri Boiss. Cruciferae. 



Cilicia. This plant has the same properties as the cresses.* 



Helianthus annuus Linn. Compositae. sunflower. 



North America. This plant is said by Pickering ' to be a native of western America 

 and is called in Mexico chimalati. Gray ' says it probably belongs to the warmer parts 

 of North America. Other botanists ascribe its origin to Mexico and Peru. Brewer and 

 Watson * say in all probability the wild sunflower of the California plains is the original 

 of the cultivated sunflower and that the seeds are now used by the Indians as food. Elahn,' 

 1 749, saw the common sunflower cultivated by the Indians at Loretto, Canada, in their 

 maize fields; the seeds were mixed with thin sagamite or maize soup. In 16 15, the sun- 

 flower was seen by Champlain among the Hurons.*" The seeds are said to be boiled and 

 eaten in Tartary. In Russia, they are ground into a meal, the finer kinds being made 

 into tea-cakes, and in some parts the whole seed is roasted and used as a substitute for coffee. 



Gerarde," in England, writes: " We have found by triall, that the buds before they 

 be flowered, boiled and eaten with butter, vinegar and pepper, after the manner of arti- 

 chokes, an exceeding pleasant meat, surpassing the artichoke far in procuring bodily lust. 

 The same buds with the stalks neere unto the top (the hairness being taken away) broiled 

 upon a gridiron and afterwards eaten with oile, vinegar, and pepper have the like property." 

 In Russia, this plant yields about 50 bushels of seed per acre, from which about 50 gallons 

 of oil are expressed and the oil-cake is said to be superior to that from linseed for the feeding 

 of cattle. This oil is used for culinary piuposes in many places in Russia. In Landeshut, 

 Germany, the carefully dried leaf is much used locally for a tobacco. The seed-receptacles 



'Gardner Trav. Braz. 6$. 1849. 



' Hartt Geog. Braz. 374. 1870. 



'Richardson, J. Arctic Explor. 1:240. 1851. {H. boreale) 



^Dall, W. H. Alaska -^i. 1897. 



'Baillon, H. Hist. Pis. 3:225. 1874. 



Pickering, C. Chron. Hist. Pis. 749. 1879. 



'Gray, A. Man. Bot. 255. 1868. 



Brewer and Watson So/. Cal. 1:353. 1880. 



'Kalm, P. Trav. No. Amer. 2:309. 1772. 



'" Parkman, F. Pion. France 395. 1894. 



" Gerarde, J. Herb. 752. 1633 or 1636. 



