244 NATURAL HISTORY OF THE FARM 
stimulating if rightly used, and yet may act as poisons if used 
in excess. Many poisons are used medicinally to stimulate 
the latent powers of the body: and most stimulants are 
poisons if too freely used. Between foods and medicines 
and poisons, no hard and fast lines can be drawn. Straw- 
berries and may-apples and other raw fruits act as poisons 
in the case of individuals. Many foods act like medicines 
on the system. Blackberries are mildly astringent: prunes 
are laxative: asparagus is diuretic: lettuce is soporific— 
these effects varying with personal idiosyncrasy. An editor 
of one of our leading agricultural journals, in an excess of 
enthusiasm, once wrote: ‘The virtues of the onion [in diet] 
render it a whole pharmacopeia in itself”. Truly, “what is 
one man’s meat may be another’s poison’’. 
It was one of the earliest tasks of mankind to explore the 
plant world and find out the source of foods and medicines 
and poisons. Primitive folk, by tasting and trying, dis- 
covered nearly all these plant resources that we know 
today. The cultivation of all our important food-plants 
antedates written history. There is hardly an American 
vegetable drug whose use was not known to the Indians 
before the coming of Columbus. 
In that day when every one garnered his living with his 
own hands, plant lore was knowledge of first importance. 
Experience was handed down by oral tradition. To what 
men knew about plants, was added much that they imagined. 
Before the days of botany, the best of this lore was published 
in herbals. These were great compilations of what was 
known or believed about the names, habits, and uses of 
plants. They included practically all known plants, and in 
the list of their ‘“‘vertues’’ nourishing and stimulating and 
curative properties are all set down together, side by side. 
The herbalists were very optimistic about plant virtues. 
Most plants were good for many of the ills of human flesh. 
