CULTURE OF THE TUBEROSE. 57 



first brought into Spain, they have from thence been dis- Westlndies. 

 persed unto divers lovers of plants." The senator Peiresc, as 

 may be learnt from Gassendi, was only fourteen years old in 

 1594, when Simon de Tovar had already cultivated it at 

 Seville, and according to Redoute, it was not planted in his 

 garden at Boisgencier, by Father Minuti, till l652, whom 

 that author makes to have brought it from Persia. I only 

 infer, however, that he travelled from Hindostan over land. 

 Redoute moreover asserts, tliat the authors of the Flora 

 Peruviana found it wild in America, but in the work itself 

 they say, cultivated in gardens. Hernandez' evidence, how« 

 ever, I think, takes away all doubt about the matter: he 

 .says, *' provenit in frigidis et temperatis regionibus, veteri 

 incognita mundo," and as the agave, to which the tubavse 

 is more immediately allied, is also a native of Mexico, I anx 

 fully of opinion that it is indigenous, there. 



The description given by the venerable I'Ecluse, of his L«Ec!use aa 

 specimen, half dried and battered by the journey, with only accurate ob- 

 the lowest flower of the spike expanded, affords a meraora- ^'^^^^'* 

 bie instance of his accuracy and discernment. The size of 

 the stem, insertion and figure of the leaves, and their hempy 

 texture, are particularly noticed ; the shape of the corolla, 

 with its general similarity to that of the Asiatic hyacinth^ 

 but in consistence rather to that of the orange, is next re- 

 marked; and having no knowledge of the root to guide his 

 judgment, but what he derived from Simon de Tovar's ap- 

 pellation of Bulbus Indicus Jiorem allmm proferens hyacinthi 

 PiientGlis ceinulum, he guesses it may possibly belong to the 

 same genus with the bulbus eriophorus, or Peruvian hi/acinth, 

 though not without some doubts raised by its stem^ being co- 

 vered with leaves, and its tubular corolla. Two years after- 

 ward, these doubts were corroborated by his receiving roots 

 both from Simon de Tovar, and the Comte d'Aremb^rg, 

 which by August were full of leaves ; and I think it wortk 

 noticing, that his figure of the plant appears evidently tft 

 have been made up from the original specimen sent by Ber- 

 nard Paludanus, and one of those growing roots, which h« 

 c.spres&ly mentions did not flower : he concludes with ob- 

 serving. 



