318 Bush-Fruits 



in cultivation and its fruit greatly improved, at least in 

 size and appearance, while the American, being young in 

 cultivation, is far behind in size, though superior in 

 quality. The English varieties all have a thick, rough 

 skin, that detracts from their value, and they are even 

 more sour than our own. The susceptibility of English 

 varieties to mildew, which has been the chief cause of 

 their failure in the United States, is really the most promi- 

 nent distinction between the two species at the present 

 time. The European type is essentially a stocky and 

 close grower whereas the American type is a slender and 

 open grower. Plate XII. 



HISTORY AND FUTURE 



Like the currant, the gooseberry appears not to have 

 been known to the ancients, and it is uncertain when it 

 first began to receive garden culture. Although long 

 common among the hedges and woods of England, it is 

 thought by most authors not to have been indigenous. 

 It is reported, as first mentioned by British authors, 

 about the beginning of the sixteenth century. Geo. W. 

 Johnson 1 states that Tusser, in his "Five Hundred Points 

 of Good Husbandry," published during 1557, mentions 

 the gooseberry as then among garden fruits. Johnson's 

 edition of Gerarde's "Herbal," published in 1636, says: 

 "There be divers sorts of the gooseberries, some greater, 

 others lesse; some round, others long, and some of a red 

 color. . . . The sorts of gooseberries are these: the long 

 greene, the great yellowish, the blew, the great round red, 

 1 The Cucumber and Gooseberry, p. 103. 



