79 



dent. The process by which the plates are reproduced is full- 

 tone collotype, making it possible to examine with a magni- 

 fying glass the finer structure caught by the camera but not 

 at once evident to the unaided eye. 



Edible Wild Plants* 



G. T. Hastings 



David Fairchild, in concluding his book The World Was My 

 Garden, says "anyone who will sincerely try can learn to enjoy 

 almost any food." While he was journeying around the world 

 sampling the foods of all peoples, Oliver Medsger has been 

 roaming meadows and woods plains and mountains sampling 

 the native plants that have been or can be used for food. And 

 he has found them good and still adds to his enjoyment of 

 outdoor life by the wild foods he finds. The book in which he 

 records his own experiences as well as information he has 

 gathered regarding the food plants used by the Indians, early 

 settlers, hunters and campers is divided into sections, — wild 

 fruits, nuts, seeds and seed pods, salad plants, roots and tubers, 

 beverage and flavoring plants, sugars and gums. In each sec- 

 tion plants from all parts of the United States are described 

 as to their characteristics, the parts used and how they are 

 best prepared. The many personal comments on the plants 

 give the book a pleasantly informal and friendly flavor. But 

 the book impresses one by its completeness and accuracy. The 

 author has consulted Sturtevant's Notes on Edible Plants and 

 other works in order to make sure no useful plants are omitted, 

 but the book is entirely Medsger's. Possibly it is an error to 

 speak of the Hog Peanut as a perennial, though it is so described 

 in the standard manuals, as in the region about New York the 

 plant is certainly an annual, growing almost always from the 

 single-seeded, underground fruit described in the book. At the 

 end there is a unique "finding index" in which plants are listed 

 under regional headings, — North Eastern United States, South- 

 ern United States, Mississippi to the Rockies, Rockies to the 

 Pacific Coast, — under each of the headings plants are listed as 

 to the parts used for food and for each plant the common and 



* Edible Wild Plants. Oliver Perry Medsger. The Macmillan Co. 1939. 

 323 pages, 16 plates. $3.50. 



