142 WEEDS AND USEFUL PLANTS. 



5. CUCUll'BITA, L. SQUASH AND PUMPKIN. 



[The Latinized Celtic name for a Gourd or hollow vessel.] 



Calyx-tube ovoid club-shaped ; limb circumcissed and deciduous. Corolla 

 bell-shaped. Fruit fleshy or finally hard and somewhat woody. Seeds 

 white, obovate, convexly compressed, the margin scarcely tumid. Trail- 

 ing annuals with subcordate leaves, branching tendrils and yellow axillary 

 subsolitary flowers. 



* Fruit always fleshy. 



1. C. PP/PO, L. Leaves obtusely cordate, somewhat 5-lobed ; fruit 

 subglobose oblong or clavate, smooth, always fleshy. 



Pumpkin. 



Fr. La grosse Citrouille. Potiron. 



Rough and hispid. Root annual. Stem 10-20 or 30 feet long, sparingly branched ; 

 tendrils branched. Leaves 9-15 or 18 inches in length ; petioles 3-6 or 8 inches long. 

 Flowers yellow, large, axillary, the staminate ones often solitary on a long peduncle. 

 Iruit of various forms, sizes and colors, the flesh of the rind usually yellow, the cavity 

 loosely filled with a yellow stringy pulp. 



Fields and lots : cultivated (usually with Indian Corn, in Pennsylvania). Native of 

 th3 East. Fl. July. Fr. October. 



06s. Extensively cultivated for its fruit, of which there are many 

 varieties ; some of them attaining to an enormous size (2 feet or more 

 in diameter), but these are not so valuable. The better sorts are 

 often used at table, affording the celebrated Pumpkin Pie of New 

 England ; and the coarser varieties are esteemed for feeding stock. 

 When growing in the immediate vicinity of Squashes, the fruit of this 

 species is liable to be converted into a Hybrid, of little or no value. I 

 have had a crop of Pumpkins totally spoiled, by inadvertently planting 

 Squashes among them, the fruit becoming very hard and warty unfit 

 for the table, and unsafe to give to cattle. 



** Fruit finally becoming subligneous. 



2. 0. ME'LOPEPO, L. Leaves subcordate, somewhat 5-angled ; fruit 

 mostly orbicular and much depressed, with the margin often tumid and 

 toruiose, at first fleshy, finally subligneous. 



Round Squash. Cymling. 



Fr. Bonnet de Pretre. Pastisson. 



Hirsute. Root annual. Stem 8-12 or 15 feet long, somewhat branching; tendrils 

 bnmrhod, sometimes transformed or developed into imperfect leaves. Leaves 6-8 

 inches long ; petioles as long as the leaves. Flowers yellow, rather large, pedunculate. 

 Fruit of various colors (mostly yellow, pale green, or mottled), smooth or sometimes 

 \vurty, the rind finally hard and woody, containing a loose stringy pulp. 



FieMs and gardens : cultivated. Native country uncertain. Fl. July. Fr. October. 



Obs. Cultivated for the young fruit, which is generally esteemed, as 

 a vegetable sauce. There are numerous varieties of the fruit and of 

 various qualities. There is also a kind of stunted variety of the plant, 

 with a short bushy stem, which is often a prolific bearer. 



