B0MUR15.A CAMMERRAL. 
European, settlers, between the visible external 
growth of this plant and our Potatoe, in= 
duced thejn diligentiv to search the soil for a 
more essential resemblance of fruit beneath the 
earth, which they might naturally indulge some 
reasonable hope to hnd. Long, it may be pre- 
sumed, had the Common Potatoe enriched the 
earth, before it was suspe6led by mankind, 
that a plant then apparently so unpromising, 
possesseda fru6tlficationat the root, capable of 
ever adding to the number of our most substan- 
tial vegetable foods : and, even after the first 
discovery of the root, it might be, and pro- 
bably was, a very considerable length of time, 
before the disagreeable earthy and austere taste, 
which it has in it's natural state, was found 
to be compleatly changed by the culinary arts 
of boiling or roasting. The pursuit of this 
idea might not prove unamusing ; but the pre- 
sent would, perhaps, be deemed no fit occasion, 
though It has certainly given birth to a long 
train of sucli refle6lions in our minds: we 
mav, however, be indulged with adding, that 
the accidental roasting of the Potatoe, by the 
a<5l of burning that plant, in common with 
other weeds or roots, most probably furnished 
man 
