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4 
658 Kitchen Garden Esculents of American Origin. [July, 
KITCHEN GARDEN ESCULENTS OF AMERICAN 
ORIGIN. III. 
BY E. LEWIS STURTEVANT, M.D. 
(Continued from p. 553, Fune number.) 
Pumpkins and Squashes.—1n New England’s Annoyances, 
Anon., 1630, the first recorded poem written in America, we 
nd: 
“If fresh meat be wanting to fill up our dish 
We have carrots and pumpkins and turnips and fish. 
Again: 
* Our pumpkins and parsnips are common supplies: 
We have pumpkins at morning and pumpkins at noon : 
If it was not for pumpkins we should be undone.” 
And: 
“ For we can make liquor to sweeten our lips 
Of pumpkins and parsnips and walnut tree chips.” 
And the pumpkin has ever been’ considered a favorite vegetable 
for the making of pies in New England, and the various squashes 
form an appreciated vegetable. 
Pumpkins and squashes seem to be of Ameidin origin, al- 
though De Candolle? says “ it may be confidently asserted that the 
pumpkins cultivated by the Romans and in the middle ages were 
Cucurbita maxima, and those of the natives of North America, 
seen by different travelers in the 17th century, were C. pepo. 
There are no figures of the pumpkin in the Herbarius Batavie 
Impressus of 1485, before the discovery of America, yet it is fre- 
quently figured by botanists of the 16th century.” Anton Pinzus" 
figures the bottle gourd, or Lagenaria, under the name of karaha or 
hara or charha of the Arabs, zucca of the Italians, Aurbss of the 
Germans, ca/abassa of the Spaniards, courge, ourle or causse of 
the French. His figure of the pumpkin is called Cucurbite indiane 
and peregrine, zucche Indiane of the Italians, courges d'yuer of the 
French, which indicates how the old world names were applied 
_ to new world resembling productions, with the origin prefix which . 
soon became dropped. 
One of the confusing elements in the research into the history 
of plants is the absurd use of common names, and often the in- 
3 applicability of the term used to express resemblance if inter- 
: Preted i in other than the most general sense. Thus Ludovico de 
1 Origin of See Py 26. 
Hist. » 1561. 
