18 MASSACHUSETTS HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



work not onl}^ of planting a nation in the wilderness but also of 

 providing food for its maintenance. 



At this time grasses were not cultivated in England, and the 

 wild herbage served here, as in the British Islands, for the cattle 

 that were imported in considerable numbers shorth' after the set- 

 tlement of Plymouth. Wheat, r3'e, barle}', beans, carrots, parsnips, 

 and turnips were soon introduced, and added to the corn, squashes, 

 and tobacco of Indian agriculture ; so that in 1629 planting and 

 gardening became tiie boast of the colonists, who wrote back to 

 England: "Wee abound with such things as, next under God, 

 doe make us subsist ; sundrie sorts of fruits, as musk-millions, 

 water-millions, Indian pompions, and many other odde fruits that 

 I cannot name." 



Later botanical investigation revealed further natural richness 

 without "the art or helpe of man," in the existence of " Purse- 

 lane, Sorrell, Peneriall, Yarrow, Mirtle, Saxafarilla," and though, 

 in their boasting, they would have included the nauseous choke- 

 cherry as yielding clusters of cherries like grapes, they confess 

 that the acrid juice did so " furre the mouth that the tongue did 

 cleave to the roof thereof, and the throat wax hoarse with swallow- 

 ing them." Their idea was, in such cases, to tame the fruit, which 

 was wilder than the Indian himself, and in this direction we see 

 the best effort of the horticulturist. 



The slow process of pomology began when Governor Winthrop 

 planted the seeds of Pippins on an island of Boston harbor, which 

 grew, and gladdened the sight of the Puritan with blossoms that 

 Eden knew, and in 1639 on the 10th of October, there were ten 

 fair pippins, fruit of that seed, " there not being one apple or pear 

 tree planted in any part of America except on that island." Tiie 

 next year Governor Endicott commenced a nursery of seedling 

 trees at Salem, and, trees being scarce, and land pleut}-, he ex- 

 changed trees for land, — two young trees for an acre. Peregrine 

 White, himself the earliest fruit of Plymouth shore, planted apples, 

 and indeed the whole colony was full3' alive to the importance of 

 apples. Quantity was desired rather than qualit}', the purpose of 

 planting so largely being to make " Syder," to which our pious an- 

 cestors were greatly addicted. 



The desire of the Puritan, distant from help and struggling for 

 bare existence, to add the Pippin to his slender list of comforts, 

 and the sour " syder" to clieer his heart and jog his liver, must be 

 considered a fortunate circumstance. Perhaps he inclined to cider 



