330 nE VIEWS. 



Lagenaria vulgaris* Bottle Gourd. — Althoiigli doubtless 

 an Old-World plant (De Candolle attributes it to India, Mo- 

 lucca, Abyssinia), yet it is not quite certain that it had not 

 reached the New AYorld before Columbus. At least the 

 following notes may be put upon record. 



M. De Candolle mentions the case of the name gourd for 

 pumpkin (" potiron ") by English writers, as " an example 

 of the confusion of poj^ular names and the greater precision 

 of scientific names." Such confusion becomes more perplex- 

 ing when we have to deal with popular names of the 15th and 

 16th centuries. Parkinson — a good observer and a respect- 

 able botanist — complained, in 1640, of " our modern writers 

 who confound Pepo, Melopepo, and Cucurbita so promiscu- 

 ously that it is not possible to find out the distinct certainty 

 of them all ; for some make that Pepo that others call Melo- 

 pepo, and others, Cucurbita." (Theater of Plants, p. 770.) 

 Scientific names of the 16th century are as obsolete as pop- 

 ular names of the same period. They do not help us to dis- 

 tinguish Lagenaria from Cucurbita, or Pepo from jNIelopepo ; 

 or Citrouille from Citrullus. Early voyagers to America 

 wrote cucurbita, calaba9a, courge, or zucca, as a name for 

 any gourd or pumpkin, and occasionally for a calabash which 

 was not even a cucurbit. The relation of the first voyage 

 of Columbus repeatedly mentions the "calabazas" used by 

 the natives of St. Domingo and other islands for carrying 

 water (Navarrete, Collec, i. 180, 188, and Dec. 3, 1492). 

 Columbus saw, near the east end of Cuba, fields planted with 

 " calabazas " and other productions of the country (id., p. 225). 

 Yet we know from Peter Martyr that some of the gourds 

 (" cucurbitse ") used in the islands grew on " cucurbiteas 

 arbores " as tall as elms (Dec. i. lib. 3, and iii. lib. 4 ; pp. 

 38, 246). This tree, Crescentia Cvjete, is described by 

 Oviedo (Historia, lib. viii. c. 4) under its Haytian name, 

 " Higuero " ; in Nicaragua it was called " Guacal " ; and in 

 Brazil, " Cuiete " ^ (Marcgrav, Hist. Nat. Brasil., 123). J. de 



^ Not " Cujete " — unless ^ has the German sound. The Tupi name is 

 formed from cu'i (cou-in, Lery) " the shell " or hard rind of a nut or fruit 

 (and the bowl or calabash made from it) and ete " good, precious." 



