1861. 



NEW ENGLAND FARMER. 



29 



For the New England Farmer. 

 TUBEROUS ROOTS. 



OK. THE MOST IMPORTANT TUBEROUS ROOTS USED BY 

 BIFFERENT PEOPLE FOR FOOD. 



BY WILSON FLAGG. 



I have carefully prepared from different sources 

 the following abstract giving an account of some 

 important facts concerning the use and culture of 

 different edible roots. I will begin with the most 

 important of all — 



THE POTATO, 

 (Solanum Tuberosum,) 



•which originated, without doubt, in America. 

 Prosperity and civilization have been developed 

 in the Old World without acquaintance with the 

 potato ; but the universal diffusion of this plant 

 among the inhabitants of Europe has produced a 

 complete revolution in their system of agricul- 

 ture, and has been the most important means of 

 preventing those famines which formerly pre- 

 vailed, before commerce had inti-oduced a greater 

 variety of resources. The exigencies of the poor 

 are met by the culture of the potato, and since 

 its introduction, no failure of this crop has oc- 

 curred simultaneously with the failure of the corn 

 crop. The root is an offset against the cereals, 

 and Divine Providence, for the benefit of man, 

 has provided that the conditions of climate which 

 cause the failure of the one shall be favorable to 

 the other. 



Still the potato crop is so important in many 

 countries in Europe, that great misery falls upon 

 common people when it fails. This was felt most 

 painfully some years ago, when the potato disease 

 first appeared, when it was so general as to de- 

 stroy almost the whole crop in Ireland, and so 

 sudden as to find the inhabitants wholly unpre- 

 pared for the emergency. In Ireland, potatoes 

 and oaten bread are the common food, and when 

 it fails thousands must perish ; yet famines are 

 by no means so frequent as they were before the 

 cultivation of the potato. It is this root, which 

 the earth produces so abundantly, that serves 

 more than any other cause to keep down the prices 

 of other products, and place them within the 

 reach of the poor. 



This plant is indigenous in the cold regions of 

 the South American Cordilleras ; and in the 

 course of about two centuries it has spread in so 

 rapid a manner, that it has become the general 

 food of whole nations in different parts of the 

 globe. Over all Europe, in Lapland, Iceland and 

 the Faroe Isles, to 71° north latitude the potato 

 is cultivated ; also in the lower plateaus of India, 

 in China, Japan, the South Sea Islands, New 

 Holland and New Zealand. It is remarkable, 

 however, that its introduction has usually been 

 opposed at first by the inhabitants. Frederic the 

 Great was obliged to compel the Pomeranians to 

 accept this boon of Providence. 



Nothing is certainly known concerning the ex- 

 tent of the native country of the potato ; but it is 

 certain that it was cultivated in the colder re- 

 gions of the South American Cordilleras, before 

 the discovery of America ; it is equally certain 

 that it was unknown to the Mexicans. Meyen, 

 a German botanist, found it wild in two different 

 places in the Cordilleras, but he does not believe 

 it has ever been found wild in Mexico. 



The colonists who arrived in Virginia in 1584 

 found the potato there ; and ships which returned 

 from the Bay of Albemarle, in 1586, brought the 

 first tubers to Ireland ; therefore, the statement 

 that Sir Francis Drake introduced this root into 

 Europe seems to be unfounded. When Drake, 

 after one of his remarkable voyages, was honored 

 by a visit to his ship from Queen Elizabeth, all 

 kinds of fruit and food which that voyager had 

 brought home with him were put upon the table. 

 In the account of that feast all the dishes are 

 named, but the potato is not mentioned. Thus 

 the name of the man who brought this blessing 

 to Europe has perished. 



THE CAMOTA, OR SWEET POTATO. 

 (Convolvulus Batatas.) 



The sweet potato is almost universally called 

 Camota in the Spanish colonies. It is indigen- 

 ous, like the true potato, in the New World, and 

 probably also in the South Sea Islands. It was 

 widely cultivated in the Sandwich Islands, before 

 the arrival of the Europeans. It has not spread 

 so widely over the earth as the common potato, 

 because it requires for its succe.«isful culture a 

 very high temperature. It is cultivated in all 

 parts of the torrid zone, and beyond the tropics 

 wherever the heat of summer is sufficiently great. 

 In the Middle States of North America it suc- 

 ceeds well, but the roots are of a poorer quality 

 than those which are raised further South. 



The tubers are mealy and of an agreeable flavor 

 and are preferred while they last, to the common 

 potato, but their sweetish taste causes them soon- 

 er to cloy the appetite, and the preference is 

 finally given to the latter, which is undoubtedly 

 more wholesome as constant food. Meyen found 

 excellent camotas in the valley of Arequipas, al- 

 most at the height of 8000 feet. 



Two varieties of the camota are cultivated, the 

 one with a yellow, the other with a white tuber. 

 There is also a distinct species cultivated in the 

 West Indies, the botanical name of which is 

 Ipoma?a tuberosa — each species being allied to 

 the garden annual known as the Morning Glory. 



Cambridge, Nov. 24, 1860. 



For the New England Farmer. 

 HOI^Eir BLADE, HUNGARIAN GRASS. 



In a communication of mine in the Weekly 

 Farmer of June 23d, which also appeared in the 

 August number of the Monthly, page 355, under 

 the above heading, I stated that I intended to 

 pick out a quantity of black seed of the above 

 grass to sow in drills by itself to see if the crop 

 would produce wholly black seed. I did so, and 

 would remark that the seed that I bought at the 

 seed store of Nourse & Co., in Boston, contained 

 but only about one-sixth black seed • of the other 

 five-sixths the seed was yellow. 



I took pains to pick out the black seed which 

 I sowed in drills in my garden. It was sown the 

 16th of June. It began to head out on the 12th 

 of August, and, was harvested the last of Sep- 

 tember. It ought to have been harvested before, 

 as the birds, particularly the yellow bird, had eat- 

 en up about one-quarter of the seed. On clean- 

 ing up the seed, after threshing, I found rather 

 over half of the seed was black, the rest of a yel- 



