active 1630-1675 John Josselyn

“ Quite as accidental, doubtless, was the beginning of European acquaintance with our plants. There are, indeed, traces of the knowledge of a few at a very early period. Dalechamp, Clusius, Lobel, and Alpinus—all authors of the sixteenth century—must be cited occasionally in any complete synonymy of our Flora. The Indian-corn, the side-saddle flower (Sarracenia purpurea and S. flava) , the columbine, the common milk-weed (Asclepias Cornuti) , the everlasting (Antennaria margaritacea) , and the Arbor vitæ, were known to the just-mentioned botanists before 1600. ”

“ The Moose Deer, which is a very goodly Creature, some of them twelve foot high, with exceeding fair Horns with broad Palms, some of them two fathom from the tip of one Horn to the other; they commonly have three Fawns at a time, their flesh is not dry like Deers flesh, but moist and lushious somewhat like Horse flesh (as they judge that have tasted of both) but very wholsome. The flesh of their Fawns is an incomparable dish, beyond the flesh of an Asses Foal so highly esteemed by the Romans, or that of young Spaniel Puppies so much cried up in our days in France and England. ”

“ Amongst other valuable pieces, I found your ‘Account of Indigenous Vegetables, botanically arranged;’ with which I was infinitely pleased, as this was the first work that gives a systematical account of New-England plants. Being a great friend to botany, and having studied it in my leisure-hours upwards of fourteen years in Pennsylvania, I know the difficulty of arranging the American plants according to the Linnæan system; and I was always eager to hear of some gentleman engaged in similar researches, that, by joining hands, we might do something towards enlarging American Botany.... ”

“ Some say it is a kind of Bind Weed; we have, in New-England two Plants, that go under the name of Sarsaparilia: the one not above a foot in height without Thorns, the other having the same Leaf, but is a shrub as high as a Goose Berry Bush, and full of sharp Thorns; this I esteem as the right, by the shape and savour of the Roots, but rather by the effects answerable to that we have from other parts of the World; It groweth upon dry Sandy banks by the Sea side, and upon the banks of Rivers, so far as the Salt water flowes; and within Land up in the Country, as some have reported. ”

“ The third kind of geese is a great grey goose, with a black neck, and a black and white head; strong of flight: and these be a great deal bigger than the ordinary geese of England; some very fat, and, in the spring, full of feathers, that the shot can scarce pierce them. Most of these geese remain with us from Michaelmas to April. They feed in the sea upon grass in the bays at low water, and gravel, and in the woods of acorns ”

“ If her husband come to seek for his squaw, and begin to bluster, the English woman betakes her to her arms, which are the war-like ladle and the scalding liquors, threatning blistering to the naked runaway, who is soon expelled by such liquid comminations. ”

“ A Wolf will eat a Wolf new dead, and so do Bears as I suppose, for their dead Carkases are never found, neither by the Indian nor English. They go a clicketing twelve days, and have as many Whelps at a Litter as a Bitch. The Indian Dog [50] is a Creature begotten ’twixt a Wolf and a Fox, which the Indians lighting upon, bring up to hunt the Deer with. The Wolf is very numerous, and go in companies, sometimes ten, twenty, more or fewer, and so cunning, that seldome any are kill’d with Guns or Traps ”

“ Having refreshed my self here for some time, and opportunely lighting upon a passage in a Bark belonging to a Friend of my Brothers, and bound to the Eastward, I put to sea again, and on the Fifteenth of August, I arrived at Black-point, otherwise called Scarborow, the habitation of my beloved Brother, [28] being about an hundred leagues to the [35] Eastward of Boston; here I resided eight years, and made it my business to discover all along the Natural, Physical, and Chyrurgical Rarities of this New-found World. ”

“ Manasseh Cutler’s Memoir, to be spoken of, enables us to limit the appearance of some other species not mentioned by Josselyn.
There is no work of any size or importance on New-England plants, after Josselyn, for the whole century which followed. We were not, indeed, without men in distinguished connection with the European scientific world. The most eminent New-England family gained honors in science, as well as in the conduct of affairs. ”

“ The second of Wood, and first of our author, is without doubt, the bald eagle; the (so to say) tyrannical habits of which bird are sufficiently well known, at least in the vivid pages of Wilson. See the Voyages, p. 96; where we learn also that “hawkes there are of several kinds; as goshawks, falcons, laniers, sparrow-hawkes, and a little black hawke highly prized by the Indians, who wear them on their heads, and is accounted of worth sufficient to ransom a sagamour. They are so strangely couragious and hardie that nothing flyeth in the air that they will not bind with. ”

“ Johnson’s edition of Gerard’s “Herbal” (1636) —which was possibly our author’s manual in the study of New-England plants—contains some dozen North-American species, furnished often from the garden of Mr. John Tradescant, who had other plants from “Virginia” beside the elegant one which bears his name; and John Parkinson—whose “Theatrum Botanicum” (1640) is declared by Tournefort to embrace a larger number of species than any work which had gone before it—describes, especially from Cornuti, a still larger number. ”

“ The ancient New-England standing Dish.
But the Houswives manner is to slice them when ripe, and cut them into dice, and so fill a pot with them of two or three Gallons, and stew them upon a gentle fire a whole day, and as they sink, they fill again with fresh Pompions, not putting any liquor to them; and when it is stew’d enough, it will look like bak’d Apples; this they Dish, putting Butter to it, and a little Vinegar, (with some Spice, as Ginger, &c.) which makes it tart like an Apple, and so serve it up to be eaten with Fish or Flesh: It provokes Urin extreamly and is very windy. ”

“ John Robin—“second to none,” says Tournefort, “in the knowledge and cultivation of plants”—was placed in charge of the Royal Botanical Garden at Paris, about the year 1570; and Vespasian Robin, “a most diligent [13] botanist,” followed, in similar connection [12] with the larger garden founded by Lewis the Thirteenth. Both are said to have assisted the writer whose book we are to notice; but especially the latter, [13] who, there is little doubt, deserves credit for all the American species described in it. ”

“ Root is made up of many small strings, growing only in the Moss, and not in the Earth, the whole Plant comes to its perfection in August, and then it has Leaves, Stalks, and Flowers as red as blood, excepting the Flower which hath some yellow admixt. ”

“ I brought home one of the Plants which was between twelve and thirteen Foot in length, I wondered at it the more for that so large and tall a Plant should grow from so small a Root, consisting of slender white strings little bigger than Bents, and not many of them, and none above a Finger long, spreading under the upper crust of the Earth ”

“ At page 72 of his Voyages, the author mentions “a small shrub, which is very common; growing sometimes to the height of elder; bearing a berry like in shape to the fruit of the white thorn; of a pale, yellow colour at first, then red (when it is ripe, of a deep purple) ; of a delicate, aromatical tast, but somewhat stiptick,”—which may be Pyrus arbutifolia, L. Higginson (New-England’s Plantation, l. c., p. 119) speaks of our haws almost as highly as Wood. ”

“ A black Wolfs Skin is worth a Beaver Skin among the Indians, being highly esteemed for helping old Aches in old people, worn as a Coat; they are not mankind, as in Ireland and other Countries, but do much harm by destroying of our English Cattle.
The Ounce. [51]
The Ounce or Wild Cat, is about the bigness of two lusty Ram Cats, preys upon Deer and our English Poultrey: I once found six whole Ducks in the belly of one I killed by a Pond side: Their flesh roasted is as good as Lamb, and as white. ”

“ But to say something of the Jaccal, they are ordinarily less than Foxes, of the colour of a gray Rabbet, and do not scent nothing near so strong as a Fox; some of the Indians will eat of them: Their Grease is good for all that Fox Grease is good for, but weaker; they are very numerous.
The Hare. [60]
The Hare in New-England is no bigger than our English Rabbets, of the same colour, but withall having yellow and black strokes down the ribs; in Winter they are milk white, and as the Spring approacheth they come to their colour ”

“ Serpentaria, Gray. But some view of the scantiness of scientific knowledge of our Flora, near forty years after Cornuti, may be had by reckoning the number of species for which Bauhin’s “Pinax” [15] and “Prodromus” (1671) are cited by Linnæus in the “Species Plantarum.” Most of them are Southern plants; and the few decidedly Northern ones which meet us—as Cornus canadensis, Uvularia perfoliata, Trillium erectum, Arum triphyllum, and Adiantum pedatum—are all indicated, by Bauhin’s phrase, as from Brazil!
We have nothing illustrating the Flora of New England from Cornuti till Josselyn. ”

“ Polyporus, Mich., sp.—In his Voyages, p. 70, the author speaks of “a stately tree growing here and there in valleys, not like to any trees in Europe; having a smooth bark, of a dark-brown colour, the leaves like great maple in England called sycamor; but larger,”—which may be Platanus occidentalis, L. (button-wood) . And Wood enables us to add one more to this early account of the genera of plants, which we possess, common to the Old World. He tells us (New-England’s Prospect, chap. v.) “the hornbound tree is a tough kind of wood, that requires so much pains in riving as is almost incredible ”

“ Our fruit-trees prosper abundantly,—apple-trees, pear-trees, quince-trees, cherry-trees, plum-trees, barberry-trees. I have observed, with admiration, that the kernels sown, or the succors planted, produce as fair and good fruit, without graffing, as the tree from whence they were taken. The countrey is replenished with fair and large orchards. It was affirmed by one Mr. Woolcut (a magistrate in Connecticut Colony) , at the Captain’s messe (of which I was) , aboard the ship I came home in, that he made five hundred hogsheads of syder out of his own orchard in one year.”—Voyages, p. ”

“ The English make use of the Leaves to keep their Feet warm. There is a little Beast called a Muskquash, that liveth in small Houses in the Ponds, like Mole Hills, that feed upon these Plants. Their Cods sent as sweet and as strong as Musk, and will last along time handsomly wrap’d up in Cotton wool; they are very good to lay amongst Cloaths. May is the best {54} time to kill them, for then their Cods sent strongest.
[103]
Wild-Leekes, which the Indians use much to eat with their fish. [192]
A Plant like Knavers-Mustard, called New-England Mustard. ”

“ The Wasps in this Countrey are pied, black and white, breed in Hives made like a great Pine Apple, their entrance is at the lower end, the whole Hive is of an Ash Colour, but of what matter its made no man knows ”

“ The bark is smooth, with knobs, or blisters, in which lyeth clear liquid turpentine,—very good to be put into salves and oyntments. The leaves, or cones, boiled in beer, are good for the scurvie. The young buds are excellent to put into epithemes for warts and corns. The rosen is altogether as good as frankincense.... The knots of this tree and fat-pine are used by the English instead of candles; and it will burn a long time: but it makes the people pale” (Josselyn’s Voyages, p. 66) ”

“ There is Oak of three kinds, white, red and black, the white is excellent to make Canoes of, Shallopes, Ships, and other Vessels for the Sea, and for Claw-board, and Pipe-staves, the black is good to make Waynscot of; and out of the white Oak Acorns, (which is the Acorn Bears delight to feed upon) : The Natives draw an Oyl, taking the rottenest Maple Wood, which being burnt to ashes, they make a strong Lye therewith, wherein they boyl their white Oak-Acorns until the Oyl swim on the top in great quantity ”

“ Prospect, l. c.) is worth comparing with Higginson’s (New-England’s Plantation, l. c.) and with Josselyn’s, both here and at pp. 23 and 114 of the Voyages. Wood justly says of this “most poisonous and dangerous creature,” that it is “nothing so bad as the report goes of him.... He is naturally,” he continues, “the most sleepy and unnimble creature that lives; never offering to leap or bite any man, if he be not trodden on first: and it is their desire, in hot weather, to lie in paths where the sun may shine on them ”

“ The white goose here mentioned is probably the snow-goose; upon which compare Nuttall, Mass. Ornith., Water-Birds, p. 344. Josselyn (Voyages, p. 100) says the brant and the gray goose “are best meat; the white are lean and tough, and live a long time; whereupon the proverb, ‘Older than a white goose:’” which is not supported by Wood or later writers. The snow-goose has become much less frequent with us since the settlement of the country. The great grey goose of Wood is our well-known Canada goose.
[39] This was the best that our author could say of the eagles of New England. ”

“ Some have killed ten or a dozen in half a day. If they can be found towards an evening, and watched where they perch,—if one come about ten or eleven of the clock,—he may shoot as often as he will: they will sit, unless they be slenderly wounded. These turkies remain all the year long. The price of a good turkey-cock is four shillings; and he is well worth it, for he may be in weight forty pounds; a hen, two shillings.”—Wood, N. Eng. Prospect, chap. viii. See also Josselyn’s Voyages, p. ”

“ For the country it is well watered as any land under the sun; every family, or every two families, having a spring of sweet water betwixt them; which is far different from the waters of England, being not so sharp, but of a fatter substance, and of a more jetty colour.... ”

“ Clownes all heal, of New-England, is another Wound Herb not Inferiour to {70} ours, but rather beyond it: Some of our English practitioners take it for Vervene, and use it for the same, wherein they are grosly mistaken.
The Leaf is like a Nettle Leaf, but narrower and longer; the stalk about the bigness of a Nettle stalk, Champhered and hollow, and of a dusky red Colour; the Flowers are blew, small, and many, growing in spoky tufts at the top, and are not hooded, but having only four round Leaves, after which followeth an infinite of small longish light brown Seed ”