398 Mr, Cutler's Account of indigenous Vegetables, 



ing to the fifteenth class : they are generally called antiscorbu- 

 tic. Those of the sixteenth, with many filaments, are muci- 

 laginous and emollient. The seventeenth has no poisonous, 

 plant ; but the seeds, which are food for men and other ani- 

 mals, are farinaceous and flatulent. Those of the nineteenth 

 are chiefly bitter ; and those of the twenty-fourth are mostly- 

 suspected or dangerous plants. 



From the want of botanical knowlege, the grossest mistakes 

 have been made in the application of the English names of Eu- 

 ropean plants, to those of America. Many of our most com- 

 mon vegetables are generally known, and some of them fre- 

 quently prescribed for medical purposes, by the names of plants, 

 that are entirely different, belonging to other classes, and possess- 

 ed, no doubt, of different properties. Botanical enquiries will 

 enable us to rectify these mistakes, and to distinguish the seve- 

 ral species of European or other foreign plants from those that: 

 are peculiar to America. 



We have it, also, in our power, from the recent settlement of 

 the country, to determine, with great certainty, what vegetable 

 productions are indigenous, and prevent those doubts and dis- 

 putes hereafter, which have frequently taken place among bo-, 

 tanists in old countries. For it is very improbable that any 

 exotic plants are become so far naturalized as not to be distin- 

 guishable from the natives. 



Was the theory of this science united with its practical uses, 

 and employed in procuring the necessaries, and adding to the- 

 conveniences and ornaments of life, the vulgar opinion of its. 

 being merely speculative would be removed, and could not fail, 

 of engaging a more general attention. For it is well known 

 that the economical uses of the vegetable kingdom are exceed-- 



ingly- 



