STURTEVANT S NOTES ON EDIBLE PLANTS 497 



in 1609 and mentioned by Edward Winslow ' among the wild fruits of Massachusetts 

 in 162 1, also by Wood,^ 1629-33. The fruit is smooth, small, purple, sweet and pleasant 

 flavored and is much used by the Indians of Colorado, Arizona, Oregon, California and 

 Utah.' To this species may be referred the gooseberries of American origin, now so 

 generally cultivated. Houghton's Seedling, one of the first, was disseminated in 1848 

 and was exhibited at the Massachusetts Horticultural Society in 1847. 



R. procumbens Pall. 



Siberia. The berries are very grateful to the taste and are rufescent when ripe.'' 



R. prostratum L'Herit. fetid currant. 



Northern America. The fruit is black, watery and insipid. It is, however, eaten 

 in Alaska.^ 



R. rotundifolium Michx. round-leaved gooseberry. 



North^America. Wood ' says the purple fruit is deliaous. Fuller ^ says it is smooth 

 and pleasant flavored. In the Flora of North America,^ the fruit is said to be about the 

 size of the black currant, purple in color and delicious. In Illinois, it is a good deal culti- 

 vated for its fruit. ' 



R. rubnun Linn, red currant. 



Northern countries, extending southward along mountain ranges. While in some 

 regions its fruit is nauseous and unpalatable, in others it has received commendation for 

 the purposes of a jelly. These contrasts show the currant to be a plant variable in nature. 

 As a cultivated plant, it began to receive notice in England towards the close of the six- 

 teenth century; it is not enumerated in Tusser's list of 1557 but is noticed by Gerarde in 

 1597 as appearing in the London markets, but he gives it no English name and no very 

 particular description. In 1586, however, Lyte gives the English names as Red Goose- 

 berryes and Bastarde Corinthes; the word currans appears in Lovell, 1665, and Ray, 1686, 

 uses our word currants. " Currant plants " were mentioned in the Memorandum of March 

 16, 1629, of seeds and plants to be provided for the New England colonists. The spelling 

 of the word probably did not become fixed for some time, as Evelyn in his translation 

 of Qtiintyne, 1693, yet uses the word currans. Mcintosh says the first mention of corans, 

 our currant, is by Bacon, who says, " The earliest fruits are strawberries, gooseberries, 

 corans, etc." 



By the herbalists and early writers on horticulture, the first mention of the currant 

 is by Ruellius,'" 1536, a French author, who praises it as a border plant and its fruit as an 



' Young, A. Chron. Pilgr. 234. 1841. 



' Wood, W. New Eng. Prosp. Prince Soc. Ed. 15. 1865. 



'U. S. D. A. Rpt.414. 1870. 



* Loudon, J. C. Arb. Frut. Brit. 2:981. 1844. 

 ' DaU, W. H. U. S. D. A. Rpt. 187. 1868. 



* Wood, A. Class Book Bot. 362. 1864. 

 'Fuller Sm. Fr. Cult. 215. 1867. 



' Gray, A. Fl. No. Amer. 1:5^7. 1840. 



* Amer. Pom. Soc. Rpt. gy. 1871. 

 " Ruellius iVa/. 5rtV^. 283. 1536. 



