312 CEREAL PLANTS. ClIAr# iy . 



and cultivated. In North America 16 the natives cultivated 

 maize, pumpkins, gourds, beans, and peas, "all different from 

 ours," and tobacco; and we are hardly justified in assuming; 

 that none of our present plants are descended from these North 

 American forms. Had North America been civilized for as long 

 a period, and as thickly peopled, as Asia or Europe, it is probable 

 that the native vines, walnuts, mulberries, crabs, and plums, 

 would have given rise, after a long course of cultivation, to a 

 multitude of varieties, some extremely different from their parent- 

 stocks ; and escaped seedlings would have caused in the New, 

 as in the Old World, much perplexity with respect to their 

 specific distinctness and parentage. 17 



Cerealia.-I will now enter on details. The cereals cultivated in Europe 

 consist of four genera-wheat, rye, barley, and oats. Of wheat the best 

 modern authorities 18 make four or five, or even seven distinct species; of 

 rye, one; of barley, three; and of oats, two, three, or four species. So 

 that altogether our cereals are ranked by different authors under from ten 

 to fifteen distinct species. These have given rise to a multitude of 

 varieties. It is a remarkable fact that botanists are not universally 

 agreed on the aboriginal parent-form of any one cereal plant. For 

 instance, a high authority writes in 1855, 19 « We ourselves have no hesi- 

 tation in stating our conviction, as the result of all the most reliable 

 evidence, that none of these Cerealia exist, or have existed, truly wild in 

 their present state, but that all are cultivated varieties of species now 

 growing in great abundance in S. Europe or W. Asia." On the other 

 hand, Alph. De Candolle 20 has adduced abundant evidence that common 

 wheat (Triticum vulgare) has been found wild in various parts of Asia, 

 where it is not likely to have escaped from cultivation; and there is 



16 For Canada, see J. Oartier's Voyage Mons (in his ' Arbres Fruitiers,' 1835, 

 in 1534; for Florida, see Narvaez and torn. i. p. 444) declares that he has 

 Ferdinand de Soto's Voyages. As I have found the types of all our cultivated 

 consulted these and other old Voyages varieties in wild seedlings, but then he 

 in more than one general collection of looks on these seedlings as so many 

 Voyages, I do not give precise references aboriginal stocks. 



to the pages. See also, for several refer- 18 See A. De Candolle, ' Geograph. 



ences, Asa Gray, in the 'American Bot.,' 1855, p. 928 et seq. Godron, ' De 



Journal of Science,' vol. xxiv., Nov. l'Espece,' 1859, torn. ii. p. 70; and 



1857, p. 441. For the traditions of the Metzger, ' Die Getreidearten,' &c, 1841. 



natives of New Zealand, see Crawfurd's 19 Mr. Bentham, in his review, en- 



* Grammar and Diet, of the Malay Lan- titled ' Hist. Notes on cultivated Plants,' 



guage,' 1852, p. eclx. by Dr. A. Targioni-Tozzetti, in < Journal 



17 See, for example, M. Hewett C. of Hort. Soc.,' vol. ix. (1855), p. 133. 

 Watson's remarks on our wild plums 20 ' Geograph. Bot.,' p. 928. The 

 and cherries and crabs : ' Cybele Britan- whole subject is discussed with admir- 

 nica,' vol. i. pp. 330, 334, &c. Van able fullness and knowledge. 



