Pliny1233 speaks of a Cucurbitacea, of which vessels and flasks for wine were made, which can only apply to this species.

It does not appear that the Arabs were early acquainted with it, for Ibn Alawâm and Ibn Baithar say nothing of it.1234 Commentators of Hebrew works attribute no name to this species with certainty, and yet the climate of Palestine is such as to popularize the use of gourds had they been known. From this it seems to me doubtful that the ancient Egyptians possessed this plant, in spite of a single figure of leaves observed on a tomb which has been sometimes identified with it.1235 Alexander Braun, Ascherson, and Magnus, in their learned paper on the Egyptian remains of plants in the Berlin Museum,1236 indicate several Cucurbitaceæ without mentioning this one. The earliest modern travellers, such as Rauwolf,1237 in 1574, saw it in the gardens of Syria, and the so-called pilgrim’s gourd, figured in 1539 by Brunfels, was probably known in the Holy Land from the Middle Ages.

All the botanists of the sixteenth century give illustrations of this species, which was more generally cultivated in Europe at that time than it is now. The common name in these older writings is Cameraria, and three kinds of fruit are distinguished. From the white colour of the flower, which is always mentioned, there can be no doubt of the species. I also note an illustration, certainly a very indifferent one, in which the flower is wanting, but with an exact representation of the fruit of the pilgrim’s gourd, which has the great interest of having appeared before the discovery of America. It is pl. 216 of Herbarius Pataviæ Impressus, in 4to, 1485—a rare work.

In spite of the use of similar names by some authors, I do not believe that the gourd existed in America before the arrival of the Europeans. The Taquera of Piso1238 and Cucurbita lagenæforma of Marcgraf1239 are perhaps Lagenaria vulgaris as monographs say,1240 and the specimens from Brazil which they mention should be certain, but that does not prove that the species was in the country before the voyage of Amerigo Vespucci in 1504. From that time until the voyages of these two botanists in 1637 and 1638, a much longer time elapsed than is needed to account for the introduction and diffusion of an annual species of a curious form, easy of cultivation, and of which the seeds long retain the faculty of germination. It may have become naturalized from cultivation, as has taken place elsewhere. It is still more likely that Cucurbita siceratia, Molina, attributed sometimes to the species under consideration, sometimes to Cucurbita maxima,1241 may have been introduced into Chili between 1538, the date of the discovery of that country, and 1787, the date of the Italian edition of Molina. Acosta1242 also speaks of calabashes which the Peruvians used as cups and vases, but the Spanish edition of his book appeared in 1591, more than a hundred years after the Conquest. Among the first naturalists to mention the species after the discovery of America (1492) is Oviedo,1243 who had visited the mainland, and, after dwelling at Vera Paz, came back to Europe in 1515, but returned to Nicaragua in 1539.1244 According to Ramusio’s compilation1245 he spoke of zueche, freely cultivated in the West India Islands and Nicaragua at the time of the discovery of America, and used as bottles. The authors of the floras of Jamaica in the seventeenth century say that the species was cultivated in that island. P. Brown,1246 however, mentions a large cultivated gourd, and a smaller one with a bitter and purgative pulp, which was found wild.

Lastly, Elliott1247 writes as follows, in 1824, in a work on the Southern States of America: “L. vulgaris is rarely found in the woods, and is certainly not indigenous. It seems to have been brought by the early inhabitants of our country from a warmer climate. The species has now become wild near dwellings, especially in islands.” The expression, “inhabitants of our country,” seems to refer rather to the colonists than to the natives. Between the discovery of Virginia by Cabot in 1497, or the travels of Raleigh in 1584, and the floras of modern botanists, more than two centuries elapsed, and the natives would have had time to extend the cultivation of the species if they had received it from Europeans. But the fact of its cultivation by Indians at the time of the earliest dealings with them is doubtful. Torrey and Gray1248 mentioned it as certain in their flora published in 1830-40, and later the second of these able botanists,1249 in an article on the Cucurbitaceæ known to the natives, does not mention the calabash, or Lagenaria. I remark the same omission in another special article on the same subject, published more recently.1250

[In the learned articles by Messrs. Asa Gray and Trumbull on the present volume (American Journal of Science, 1883, p. 370), they give reasons for supposing the species known and indigenous in America previous to the arrival of the Europeans. Early travellers are quoted more in detail than I had done. From their testimony it appears that the inhabitants of Peru, Brazil, and of Paria possessed gourds, in Spanish calabazas, but I do not see that this proves that this was the species called by botanists Cucurbita lagmaria. The only character independent of the exceedingly variable form of the fruit is the white colour of the flowers, and this character is not mentioned.—Author’s Note, 1884.]

Gourd—Cucurbita maxima, Duchesne.

In enumerating the species of the genus Cucurbita, I should explain that their distinction, formerly exceedingly difficult, has been established by M. Naudin1251 in a very scientific manner, by means of an assiduous cultivation of varieties and of experiments upon their crossed fertilization. Those groups of forms which cannot fertilize each other, or of which the product is not fertile and stable, are regarded by him as species, and the forms which can be crossed and yield a fertile and varied product, as races, breeds, or varieties. Later experiments1252 showed him that the establishment of species on this basis is not without exceptions, but in the genus Cucurbita physiological facts agree with exterior differences. M. Naudin has established the true distinctive characters of C. maxima and C. Pepo. The leaves of the first have rounded lobes, the peduncles are smooth and the lobes of the corolla are curved outwards; the second has leaves with pointed lobes, the peduncles marked with ridges and furrows, the corolla narrowed towards the base and with lobes nearly always upright.

The principal varieties of Cucurbita maxima are the great yellow gourd, which sometimes attains to an enormous size,1253 the Spanish gourd, the turban gourd, etc.

Since common names and those in ancient authors do not agree with botanical definitions, we must mistrust the assertions formerly put forth on the origin and early cultivation of such and such a gourd at a given epoch in a given country. For this reason, when I considered the subject in 1855, the home of these plants seemed to me either unknown or very doubtful. At the present day it is more easy to investigate the question.

According to Sir Joseph Hooker,1254 Cucurbita maxima was found by Barter on the banks of the Niger in Guinea, apparently indigenous, and by Welwitsch in Angola without any assertion of its wild character. In works on Abyssinia, Egypt, or other African countries in which the species is commonly cultivated, I find no indication that it is found wild. The Abyssinians used the word dubba, which is applied in Arabic to gourds in general.

The plant was long supposed to be of Indian origin, because of such names as Indian gourd, given by sixteenth-century botanists, and in particular the Pepo maximus indicus, figured by Lobel,1255 which answers to the modern species; but this is a very insufficient proof, since popular indications of origin are very often erroneous. The fact is that though pumpkins are cultivated in Southern Asia, as in other parts of the tropics, the plant has not been found wild.1256 No similar species is indicated by ancient Chinese authors, and the modern names of gourds and pumpkins now grown in China are of foreign and southern origin.1257 It is impossible to know to what species the Sanskrit name kurkarou belonged, although Roxburgh attributes it to Cucurbita Pepo; and there is no less uncertainty with respect to the gourds, pumpkins, and melons cultivated by the Greeks and Romans. It is not certain if the species was known to the ancient Egyptians, but perhaps it was cultivated in that country and in the Græco-Roman world. The Pepones, of which Charlemagne commanded the cultivation in his farms,1258 were perhaps some kind of pumpkin or marrow, but no figure or description of these plants which may be clearly recognized exists earlier than the sixteenth century.

This tends to show its American origin. Its existence in Africa in a wild state is certainly an argument to the contrary, for the species of the family of Cucurbitaceæ are very local; but there are arguments in favour of America, and I must examine them with the more care since I have been reproached in the United States for not having given them sufficient weight.

In the first place, out of the ten known species of the genus Cucurbita, six are certainly wild in America (Mexico and California); but these are perennial species, while the cultivated pumpkins are annuals.

The plant called jurumu by the Brazilians, figured by Piso and Marcgraf1259 is attributed by modern writers to Cucurbita maxima. The drawing and the short account by the two authors agree pretty well with this theory, but it seems to have been a cultivated plant. It may have been brought from Europe or from Africa by Europeans, between the discovery of Brazil in 1504, and the travels of the above-named authors in 1637 and 1638. No one has found the species wild in North or South America. I cannot find in works on Brazil, Guiana, or the West Indies any sign of an ancient cultivation or of wild growth, either from names, or from traditions or more or less distinct belief. In the United States those men of science who best know the languages and customs of the natives, Dr. Harris for instance, and more recently Trumbull,1260 maintain that the Cucurbitaceæ called squash by the Anglo-Americans, and macock, or cashaw, cushaw, by early travellers in Virginia, are pumpkins. Trumbull says that squash is an Indian word. I have no reason to doubt the assertion, but neither the ablest linguists, nor the travellers of the seventeenth century, who saw the natives provided with fruits which they called gourds and pumpkins, have been able to prove that they were such and such species recognized as distinct by modern botanists. All that we learn from this is that the natives a century after the discovery of Virginia, and twenty to forty years after its colonization by Sir Walter Raleigh, made use of some fruits of the Cucurbitaceæ. The common names are still so confused in the United States, that Dr. Asa Gray, in 1868, gives pumpkin and squash as answering to different species of Cucurbita,1261 while Darlington1262 attributes the name pumpkin to the common Cucurbita Pepo, and that of squash to the varieties of the latter which correspond to the forms of Melopepo of early botanists. They attribute no distinct common name to Cucurbita maxima.

Finally, without placing implicit faith in the indigenous character of the plant on the banks of the Niger, based upon the assertion of a single traveller, I still believe that the species is a native of the old world, and introduced into America by Europeans.

[The testimony of early travellers touching the existence of Cucurbita maxima in America before the arrival of Europeans has been collected and supplemented by Messrs. Asa Gray and Trumbull (American Journal of Science, 1883, p. 372). They confirm the fact already known, that the natives cultivated species of Cucurbita under American names, of which some remain in the modern idiom of the United States. None of these early travellers has noted the botanical characters by which Naudin established the distinction between C. maxima and C. Pepo, and consequently it is still doubtful to which species they referred. For various reasons I had already admitted that C. Pepo was of American origin, but I retain my doubts about C. maxima. After a more attentive perusal of Tragus and Matthiolo than I had bestowed upon them, Asa Gray and Trumbull notice that they call Indian whatever came from America. But if these two botanists did not confound the East and West Indies, several others, and the public in general, did make this confusion, which occasioned errors touching the origin of species which botanists were liable to repeat. A further indication in favour of the American origin of C. maxima is communicated by M. Wittmack, who informs me that seeds, certified by M. Naudin to belong to this species, have been found in the tombs of Ancon. This would be conclusive if the date of the latest burials at Ancon were certain. See on this head the article on Phaseolus vulgaris.—Author’s Note, 1884.]

Pumpkin—Cucurbita Pepo and C. Melopepo, Linnæus. Modern authors include under the head of Cucurbita Pepo most of the varieties which Linnæus designated by this name, and also those which he called C. Melopepo. These varieties are very different as to the shape of the fruit, which shows a very ancient cultivation. There is the Patagonian pumpkin, with enormous cylindrical fruit; the sugared pumpkin, called Brazilian; the vegetable marrow, with smaller long-shaped fruit; the Barberine, with knobby fruit; the Elector’s hat, with a curiously shaped conical fruit, etc. No value should be attached to the local names in this designation of varieties, for we have often seen that they express as many errors as varieties. The botanical names attributed to the species by Naudin and Cogniaux are numerous, on account of the bad habit which existed not long ago of describing as species purely garden varieties, without taking into account the wonderful effects of cultivation and selection upon the organ for the sake of which the plant is cultivated.

Most of these varieties exist in the gardens of the warm and temperate regions of both hemispheres. The origin of the species is considered to be doubtful. I hesitated in 18551263 between Southern Asia and the Mediterranean basin. Naudin and Cogniaux1264 admit Southern Asia as probable, and the botanists of the United States on their side have given reasons for their belief in an American origin. The question requires careful investigation.

I shall first seek for those forms now attributed to the species which have been found growing anywhere in a wild state.

The variety Cucurbita ovifera, Linnæus, was formerly gathered by Lerche, near Astrakhan, but no modern botanist has confirmed this fact, and it is probable it was a cultivated plant. Moreover, Linnæus does not assert it was wild. I have consulted all the Asiatic and African floras without finding the slightest mention of a wild variety. From Arabia, or even from the coast of Guinea to Japan, the species, or the varieties attributed to it, are always said to be cultivated. In India, Roxburgh remarked this, and certainly Clarke, in his recent flora of British India, has good reasons for indicating no locality for it outside cultivation.

It is otherwise in America. A variety, C. texana,1265 very near to the variety ovata, according to Asa Gray, and which is now unhesitatingly attributed to C. Pepo, was found by Lindheimer “on the edges of thickets, in damp woods, on the banks of the upper Guadaloupe, apparently an indigenous plant.” Asa Gray adds, however, that it is perhaps the result of naturalization. However, as several species of the genus Cucurbita grow wild in Mexico and in the south-west of the United States, we are naturally led to consider the collector’s opinion sound. It does not appear that other botanists found this plant in Mexico, or in the United States. It is not mentioned in Hemsley’s Biologia Centrali-Americana, nor in Asa Gray’s recent flora of California.

Some synonyms or specimens from South America, attributed to C. Pepo, appear to me very doubtful. It is impossible to say what Molina1266 meant by the names C. Siceratia and C. mammeata, which appear, moreover, to have been cultivated plants. Two species briefly described in the account of the journey of Spix and Martius (ii. p. 536), and also attributed to C. Pepo,1267 are mentioned among cultivated plants on the banks of the Rio Francisco. Lastly, the specimen of Spruce, 2716, from the river Uaupes, a tributary of the Rio Negro, which Cogniaux1268 does not mention having seen, and which he first attributed to the C. Pepo, and afterwards to the C. moschata, was perhaps cultivated or naturalized from cultivation, or by transport, in spite of the paucity of inhabitants in this country.

Botanical indications are, therefore, in favour of a Mexican or Texan origin. It remains to be seen if historical records are in agreement with or contrary to this idea.

It is impossible to discover whether a given Sanskrit, Greek, or Latin name for the pumpkin belongs to one species rather than to another. The form of the fruit is often the same, and the distinctive characters are never mentioned by authors.

There is no figure of the pumpkin in the Herbarius Pataviæ Impressus of 1485, before the discovery of America, but sixteenth-century authors have published plates which may be attributed to it. There are three forms of Pepones figured on page 406 of Dodoens, edition 1557. A fourth, Pepo rotundus major, added in the edition of 1616, appears to me to be C. maxima. In the drawing of Pepo oblongus of Lobel, Icones, 641, the character of the peduncle is clearly defined. The names given to these plants imply a foreign origin; but the authors could make no assertions on this head, all the more that the name of “the Indies” applied both to Southern Asia and America.

Thus historical data do not gainsay the opinion of an American origin, but neither do they adduce anything in support of it.

If the belief that it grows wild in America is confirmed, 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 travellers in the seventeenth century, were Cucurbita Pepo.

Musk, or Melon Pumpkin—Cucurbita moschata, Duchesne.

The Bon Jardinier quotes as the principal varieties of this species pumpkin muscade de Provence, pleine de Naples, and de Barbarie. It is needless to say that these names show nothing as to origin. The species is easily recognized by its fine soft down, the pentagonal peduncle which supports the fruit broadening at the summit; the fruit is more or less covered with a glaucous efflorescence, and the flesh is somewhat musk-scented. The lobes of the calyx are often terminated by a leafy border.1269 Cultivated in all tropical countries, it is less successful than other pumpkins in temperate regions.

Cogniaux1270 suspects that it comes from the south of Asia, but he gives no proof of this. I have searched through the floras of the old and new worlds, and I have nowhere been able to discover the mention of the species in a truly wild state. The indications which approach most nearly to it are: (1) In Asia, in the island of Bangka, a specimen verified by Cogniaux, and which Miquel1271 says is not cultivated; (2) in Africa, in Angola, specimens which Welwitsch says are quite wild, but “probably due to an introduction;” (3) in America, five specimens from Brazil, Guiana, or Nicaragua, mentioned by Cogniaux, without knowing whether they were cultivated, naturalized, or indigenous. These indications are very slight. Rumphius, Blume, Clarke (Flora of British India) in Asia, Schweinfurth (Oliver’s Flora of Trop. Africa) in Africa, only know it as a cultivated plant. Its cultivation is recent in China,1272 and American floras rarely mention the species.

No Sanskrit name is known, and the Indian, Malay, and Chinese names are neither very numerous nor very original, although the cultivation of the plant seems to be more diffused in Southern Asia than in other parts of the tropics. It was already grown in the seventeenth century according to the Hortus Malabaricus, in which there is a good plate (vol. viii. pl. 2). It does not appear that this species was known in the sixteenth century, for Dalechamp’s illustration (Hist., i. p. 616) which Seringe attributed to it has not its true characters, and I can find no other figure which resembles it.

Fig-leaved Pumpkin—Cucurbita ficifolia, Bouché; Cucurbita melanosperma, Braun.

About thirty years ago this pumpkin with black or brown seeds was introduced into gardens. It differs from other cultivated species in being perennial. It is sometimes called the Siamese melon. The Bon Jardinier says that it comes from China. Dr. Bretschneider does not mention it in his letter of 1881, in which he enumerates the pumpkins grown by the Chinese.

Hitherto no botanist has found it wild. I very much doubt its Asiatic origin as all the known perennial species of Cucurbita are from Mexico or California.

Melon—Cucumis Melo, Linnæus.

The aspect of the question as to the origin of the melon has completely changed since the experiments of Naudin. The paper which he published in 1859, in the Annales des Sciences Naturelles, 4th series, vol. ii., on the genus Cucumis, is as remarkable as that on the genus Cucurbita. He gives an account of the observations and experiments of several years on the variability of forms and the crossed fecundation of a multitude of species, breeds, or varieties coming from all parts of the world. I have already spoken (p. 250) of the physiological principle on which he believes it possible to distinguish those groups of forms which he terms species, although certain exceptions have occurred which render the criterion of fertilization less absolute. In spite of these exceptional cases, it is evident that if nearly allied forms can be easily crossed and produce fertile individuals, as we see, for example, in the human species, they must be considered as constituting a single species.

In this sense Cucumis Melo, according to the experiments and observations made by Naudin upon about two thousand living plants, constitutes a species which comprehends an extraordinary number of varieties and even of breeds; that is to say, forms which are preserved by heredity. These varieties or races can be fertilized by each other, and yield varied and variable products. They are classed by the author into ten groups, which he calls canteloups, melons brodés, sucrins, melons d’hiver, serpents, forme de concombre, Chito, Dudaim, rouges de Perse, and sauvages, each containing varieties or nearly allied races. These have been named in twenty-five or thirty different ways by botanists, who, without noticing transitions of form, the faculty of crossing or of change under cultivation, have distinguished as species all the varieties which occur in a given time or place.

Hence it results that several forms found wild, and which have been described as species, must be the types and sources of the cultivated forms; and Naudin makes the very just observation that these wild forms, which differ more or less the one from the other, may have produced different cultivated varieties. This is the more probable that they sometimes inhabit countries remote from each other as Southern Asia and tropical Africa, so that differences in climate and isolation may have created and consolidated varieties.

The following are the forms which Naudin enumerates as wild: 1. Those of India, which are named by Wildenow Cucumis pubescens, and by Roxburgh C. turbinatus or C. maderas-patanus. The whole of British India and Beluchistan is their natural area. Its natural wildness is evident even to non-botanical travellers.1273 The fruit varies from the size of a plum to that of a lemon. It is either striped or barred, or all one colour, scented or odourless. The flesh is sweet, insipid, or slightly acid, differences which it has in common with the cultivated Cantelopes. According to Roxburgh the Indians gather and have a taste for the fruits of C. turbinatus and of C. maderas-patanus, though they do not cultivate it.

Referring to the most recent flora of British India, in which Clarke has described the Cucurbitaceæ (ii. p. 619), it seems that this author does not agree with M. Naudin about the Indian wild forms, although both have examined the numerous specimens in the herbarium at Kew. The difference of opinion, more apparent than real, arises from the fact that the English author attributes to a nearly and certainly wild allied species, C. trigonus, Roxburgh, the varieties which Naudin classes under C. Melo. Cogniaux,1274 who afterwards saw the same specimens, attributes only C. turbinatus to trigonus. The specific difference between C. Melo and C. trigonus is unfortunately obscure, from the characters given by these three authors. The principal difference is that C. Melo is an annual, the other perennial, but this duration does not appear to be very constant. Mr. Clarke says himself that C. Melo is perhaps derived by cultivation from C. trigonus; that is to say, according to him, from the forms which Naudin attributes to C. Melo.

The experiments made during three consecutive years by Naudin1275 upon the products of Cucumis trigonus, fertilized by C. Melo, seem in favour of the opinion which admits a specific diversity; for if fertilization took place the products were of different forms, and often reverted to one or other of the original parents.

2. The African forms. Naudin had no specimens in sufficiently good condition, or of which the wild state was sufficiently certain to assert positively the habitation of the species in Africa. He admits it with hesitation. He includes in the species cultivated forms, or other wild ones, of which he had not seen the fruit. Sir Joseph Hooker1276 subsequently obtained specimens which prove more. I am not speaking of those from the Nile Valley,1277 which are probably cultivated, but of plants gathered by Barter in Guinea in the sands on the banks of the Niger. Thonning1278 had previously found, in sandy soil in Guinea, a Cucumis to which he had given the name arenarius; and Cogniaux,1279 after having seen a specimen brought home by this traveller, had classed it with C. Melo, as Sir J. Hooker thought. The negroes eat the fruit of the plant found by Barter. The smell is that of a fresh green melon. In Thonning’s plant the fruit is ovoid, the size of a plum. Thus in Africa as in India the species bears small fruit in a wild state, as we might expect. The Dudaim among cultivated varieties is allied to it.

The majority of the species of the genus Cucumis are found in Africa; a small minority in Asia or in America. Other species of Cucurbitaceæ are divided between Asia and America, although as a rule, in this family, the areas of species are continuous and restricted. Cucumis Melo was once perhaps, like Citrullus Colocynthis of the same family, wild from the west coast of Africa as far as India without any break.

I formerly hesitated to admit that the melon was indigenous in the north of the Caucasus, as it is asserted by ancient authors—an assertion which has not been confirmed by subsequent botanists. Hohenacker, who was said to have found the species near Elisabethpolis, makes no mention of it in his paper upon the province of Talysch. M. Boissier does not include Cucumis Melo in his Oriental flora. He merely says that it is easily naturalized on rubbish-heaps and waste ground. The same thing has been observed elsewhere, for instance in the sands of Ussuri, in Eastern Asia. This would be a reason for mistrusting the locality of the sands of the Niger, if the small size of the fruit in this case did not recall the wild forms of India.

The culture of the melon, or of different varieties of the melon, may have begun separately in India and Africa.

Its introduction into China appears to date only from the eighth century of our era, judging from the epoch of the first work which mentions it.1280 As the relations of the Chinese with Bactriana, and the north-west of India by the embassy of Chang-kien, date from the second century, it is possible that the culture of the species was not then widely diffused in Asia. The small size of the wild fruit offered little inducement. No Sanskrit name is known, but there is a Tamul name, probably less ancient, molam,1281 which is like the Latin Melo.

It is not proved that the ancient Egyptians cultivated the melon. The fruit figured by Lepsius1282 is not recognizable. If the cultivation had been customary and ancient in that country, the Greeks and Romans would have early known it. Now, it is doubtful whether the Sikua of Hippocrates and Theophrastus, or the Pepon of Dioscorides, or the Melopepo of Pliny, was the melon. The passages referring to it are brief and insignificant; Galen1283 is less obscure, when he says that the inside of the Melopepones is eaten, but not of the Pepones. There has been much discussion about those names,1284 but we want facts more than words. The best proof which I have been able to discover of the existence of the melon among the Romans is a very accurate representation of a fruit in the beautiful mosaic of fruits in the Vatican. Moreover, Dr. Comes certifies that the half of a melon is represented in a painting at Herculaneum.1285 The species was probably introduced into the Græco-Roman world at the time of the Empire, in the beginning of the Christian era. It was probably of indifferent quality, to judge from the silence or the faint praise of writers in a country where gourmets were not wanting. Since the Renaissance, an improved cultivation and relations with the East have introduced better varieties into our gardens. We know, however, that they often degenerate either from cold or bad conditions of soil, or by crossing with inferior varieties of the species.

Water-Melon—Citrullus vulgaris, Schrader; Cucurbita Citrullus, Linnæus.

The origin of the water-melon was long mistaken or unknown. According to Linnæus, it was a native of Southern Italy.1286 This assertion was taken from Matthiole, without observing that this author says it was a cultivated species. Seringe,1287 in 1828, supposed it came from India and Africa, but he gives no proof. I believed it came from Southern Asia, because of its very general cultivation in this region. It was not known in a wild state. At length it was found indigenous in tropical Africa, on both sides of the equator, which settles the question.1288 Livingstone1289 saw districts literally covered with it, and the savages and several kinds of wild animals eagerly devoured the wild fruit. They are sometimes, but not always, bitter, and this cannot be detected from the appearance of the fruit. The negroes strike it with an axe, and taste the juice to see whether it is good or bad. This diversity in the wild plant, growing in the same climate and in the same soil, is calculated to show the small value of such a character in cultivated Cucurbitaceæ. For the rest, the frequent bitterness of the water-melon is not at all extraordinary, as the most nearly allied species is Citrullus Colocynthis. Naudin obtained fertile hybrids from crossing the bitter water-melon, wild at the Cape, with a cultivated species which confirms the specific unity suggested by the outward appearance.

The species has not been found wild in Asia.

The ancient Egyptians cultivated the water-melon, which is represented in their paintings.1290 This is one reason for believing that the Israelites knew the species, and called it abbatitchim, as is said; but besides the Arabic name, battich, batteca, evidently derived from the Hebrew, is the modern name for the water-melon. The French name, pastèque, comes through the Arabic from the Hebrew. A proof of the antiquity of the plant in the north of Africa is found in the Berber name, tadelaât,1291 which differs too widely from the Arabic name not to have existed before the Conquest. The Spanish names zandria, cindria, and the Sardinian sindria,1292 which I cannot connect with any others, show also an ancient culture in the eastern part of the Mediterranean basin. Its cultivation early spread into Asia, for there is a Sanskrit name, chayapula,1293 but the Chinese only received the plant in the tenth century of the Christian era. They call it si-kua, that is melon of the West.1294

As the water-melon is an annual, it ripens out of the tropics wherever the summer is sufficiently hot. The modern Greeks cultivate it largely, and call it carpousia or carpousea,1295 but this name does not occur in ancient authors, nor even in the Greek of the decadence and of the Middle Ages.1296 It is the same as the karpus of the Turks of Constantinople,1297 which we find again in the Russian arbus,1298 and in Bengali and Hindustani as tarbuj, turbouz.1299 Another Constantinople name, mentioned by Forskal, chimonico, recurs in Albanian chimico.1300 The absence of an ancient Greek name which can with certainty be attributed to this species, seems to show that it was introduced into the Græco-Roman world about the beginning of the Christian era. The poem Copa, attributed to Virgil and Pliny, perhaps mentions it (lib. 19, cap. 5), as Naudin thinks, but it is doubtful.

Europeans have introduced the water-melon into America, where it is now cultivated from Chili to the United States. The jacé of the Brazilians, of which Piso and Marcgraf have a drawing, is evidently introduced, for the first-named author says it is cultivated and partly naturalized.1301

Cucumber—Cucumis sativus, Linnæus.

In spite of the very evident difference between the melon and cucumber, which both belong to the genus Cucumis, cultivators suppose that the species may be crossed, and that the quality of the melon is thus sometimes spoilt. Naudin1302 ascertained by experiments that this fertilization is not possible, and has also shown that the distinction of the two species is well founded.

The original country of Cucumis sativus was unknown to Linnæus and Lamarck. In 1805, Wildenow1303 asserted it was indigenous in Tartary and India, but without furnishing any proof. Later botanists have not confirmed the assertion. When I went into the question in 1855, the species had not been anywhere found wild. For various reasons deduced from its ancient culture in Asia and in Europe, and especially from the existence of a Sanskrit name, soukasa,1304 I said, “Its original habitat is probably the north-west of India, for instance Cabul, or some adjacent country. Everything seems to show that it will one day be discovered in these regions which are as yet but little known.”

This conjecture has been realized if we admit, with the best-informed modern authors, that Cucumis Hardwickii, Royle, possesses the characteristics of Cucumis sativus. A coloured illustration of this cucumber found at the foot of the Himalayas may be seen in Royle’s Illustrations of Himalayan Plants, p. 220, pl. 47. The stems, leaves, and flowers are exactly those of C. sativus. The fruit, smooth and elliptical, has a bitter taste; but there are similar forms of the cultivated cucumber, and we know that in other species of the same family, the water-melon, for instance, the pulp is sweet or bitter. Sir Joseph Hooker, after describing the remarkable variety which he calls the Sikkim cucumber,1305 adds that the variety Hardwickii, wild from Kumaon to Sikkim, and of which he has gathered specimens, does not differ more from the cultivated plant than certain varieties of the latter differ from others; and Cogniaux, after seeing the plants in the herbarium at Kew, adopts this opinion.1306

The cucumber, cultivated in India for at least three thousand years, was only introduced into China in the second century before Christ, when the ambassador Chang-kien returned from Bactriana.1307 The species spread more rapidly towards the West. The ancient Greeks cultivated the cucumber under the name of sikuos,1308 which remains as sikua in the modern language. The modern Greeks have also the name aggouria, from an ancient Aryan root which is sometimes applied to the water-melon, and which recurs for the cucumber in the Bohemian agurka, the German Gurke, etc. The Albanians (Pelasgians?) have quite a different name, kratsavets,1309 which we recognize in the Slav Krastavak. The Latins called the cucumber cucumis. These different names show the antiquity of the species in Europe. There is even an Esthonian name, uggurits, ukkurits, urits.1310 It does not seem to be Finnish, but to belong to the same Aryan root as aggouria. If the cucumber came into Europe before the Aryans, there would perhaps be some name peculiar to the Basque language, or seeds would have been found in the lake-dwellings of Switzerland and Savoy; but this is not the case. The peoples in the neighbourhood of the Caucasus have names quite different to the Greek; in Tartar kiar, in Kalmuck chaja, in Armenian karan.1311 The name chiar exists also in Arabic for a variety of the cucumber.1312 This is, therefore, a Turanian name anterior to the Sanskrit, whereby its culture in Western Asia would be more than three thousand years old.

It is often said that the cucumber is the kischschuim, one of the fruits of Egypt regretted by the Israelites in the desert.1313 However, I do not find any Arabic name among the three given by Forskal which can be connected with this, and hitherto no trace has been found of the presence of the cucumber in ancient Egypt.

West Indian Gherkin—Cucumis Anguria, Linnæus.

This small species of cucumber is designated in the Bon Jardinier under the name of the cucumber Arada. The fruit, of the size of an egg, is very prickly. It is eaten cooked or pickled. As the plant is very productive, it is largely cultivated in the American colonies. Descourtilz and Sir Joseph Hooker have published good coloured illustrations of it, and M. Cogniaux a plate with a detailed analysis of the flower.1314

Several botanists affirm that it is wild in the West Indies. P. Browne,1315 in the last century, spoke of the plant as the “little wild cucumber” (in Jamaica). Descourtilz said, “The cucumber grows wild everywhere, and principally in the dry savannahs and near rivers, whose banks afford a rich vegetation.” The inhabitants call it the “maroon cucumber.” Grisebach1316 saw specimens in several other West India Isles, and appears to admit their wild character. M. E. André found the species growing in the sand of the sea-shore at Porto-Cabello, and Burchell in a similar locality in Brazil, and Riedel near Rio di Janeiro.1317 In the case of a number of other specimens gathered in the east of America from Brazil to Florida, it is unknown whether they were wild or cultivated. A wild Brazilian plant, badly drawn by Piso,1318 is mentioned as belonging to the species, but I am very doubtful of this.

Botanists from Tournefort down to our own day have considered the Anguria to be of American origin, a native of Jamaica in particular. M. Naudin1319 was the first to point out that all the other species of Cucumis are of the old world, and principally African. He wondered whether this one had not been introduced into America by the negroes, like many other plants which have become naturalized. However, unable to find any similar African plant, he adopted the general opinion. Sir Joseph Hooker, on the contrary, is inclined to believe that C. Anguria is a cultivated and modified form of some African species nearly allied to C. prophetarum and C. Figarei, although these are perennial. In favour of this hypothesis, I may add: (1) The name maroon cucumber, given in the French West India Islands, indicates a plant which has become wild, for this is the meaning of the word maroon as applied to the negroes; (2) its extended area in America from Brazil to the West Indies, always along the coast where the slave trade was most brisk, seems to be a proof of foreign origin. If the species grew in America previous to its discovery, it would, with such an extensive habitat, have been also found upon the west coast of America, and inland, which is not the case.

The question can only be solved by a more complete knowledge of the African species of Cucumis, and by experiments upon fertilization, if any have the patience and ability necessary to do for the genus Cucumis what Naudin has done for the genus Cucurbita.

Lastly, I would point out the absurdity of a common name for the Anguria in the United States—Jerusalem Cucumber.1320 After this, is it possible to take popular names as a guide in our search for origins?

White Gourd-melon, or Benincasa—Benincasa hispida, Thunberg; Benincasa cerifera, Savi.

This species, which is the only one of the genus Benincasa, is so like the pumpkins that early botanists took it for one,1321 in spite of the waxy efflorescence on the surface of the fruit. It is very generally cultivated in tropical countries. It was, perhaps, a mistake to abandon its cultivation in Europe after having tried it, for Naudin and the Bon Jardinier both recommend it.

It is the cumbalam of Rheede, the camolenga of Rumphius, who had seen it cultivated in Malabar and the Sunda Islands, and give illustrations of it.

From several works, even recent ones,1322 it might be supposed that it had never been found in a wild state, but if we notice the different names under which it has been described we shall find that this is not the case. Thus Cucurbita hispida, Thunberg, and Lagenaria dasystemon, Miquel, from authentic specimens seen by Cogniaux,1323 are synonyms of the species, and these plants are wild in Japan.1324 Cucurbita littoralis, Hasskarl,1325 found among shrubs on the sea-shore in Java, and Gymnopetalum septemlobum, Miquel, also in Java, are the Benincasa according to Cogniaux. As are also Cucurbita vacua, Mueller,1326 and Cucurbita pruriens, Forster, of which he has seen authentic specimens found at Rockingham, in Australia, and in the Society Islands. Nadeaud1327 does not mention the latter. Temporary naturalization may be suspected in the Pacific Isles and in Queensland, but the localities of Java and Japan seem quite certain. I am the more inclined to believe in the latter, that the cultivation of the Benincasa in China dates from the remotest antiquity.1328

Towel Gourd—Momordica cylindrica, Linnæus; Luffa cylindrica, Rœmer.

Naudin1329 says, “Luffa cylindrica, which in some of our colonies has retained the Indian name pétole, is probably a native of Southern Asia, and perhaps also of Africa, Australia, and Polynesia. It is cultivated by the peoples of most hot countries, and it appears to be naturalized in many places where it doubtless did not exist originally.” Cogniaux1330 is more positive. “An indigenous species,” he says, “in all the tropical regions of the old world; often cultivated and half wild in America between the tropics.” In consulting the works quoted in these two monographs, and herbaria, its character as a wild plant will be found sometimes conclusively certified.

With regard to Asia,1331 Rheede saw it in sandy places, in woods and other localities in Malabar; Roxburgh says it is wild in Hindustan; Kurz, in the forests of Burmah; Thwaites, in Ceylon. I have specimens from Ceylon and Khasia. There is no Sanskrit name known, and Dr. Bretschneider, in his work On the Study and Value of Chinese Botanical Works, and in his letters mentions no luffa either wild or cultivated in China. I suppose, therefore, that its cultivation is not ancient even in India.

The species is wild in Australia, on the banks of rivers in Queensland,1332 and hence it is probable it will be found wild in the Asiatic Archipelago, where Rumphius, Miquel, etc., only mention it as a cultivated plant.

Herbaria contain a great number of specimens from tropical Africa, from Mozambique to the coast of Guinea, and even as far as Angola, but collectors do not appear to have indicated whether they were cultivated or wild plants. In the Delessert herbarium, Heudelot indicates it as growing in fertile ground in the environs of Galam. Sir Joseph Hooker1333 quotes this without affirming anything. Schweinfurth and Ascheron,1334 who are always careful in this matter, say the species is only a cultivated one in the Nile Valley. This is curious, because the plant was seen in the seventeenth century in Egyptian gardens under the Arabian name of luff,1335 whence the genus was called Luffa, and the species Luffa ægyptica. The ancient Egyptian monuments show no trace of it. The absence of a Hebrew name is another reason for believing that its cultivation was introduced into Egypt in the Middle Ages. It is now grown in the Delta, not only for the fruit but also for the export of the seed, from which a preparation is made for softening the skin.

The species is cultivated in Brazil, Guiana, Mexico, etc., but I find no indication that it is indigenous in America. It appears to have been here and there naturalized, in Nicaragua for instance, from a specimen of Levy’s.

In brief, the Asiatic origin is certain, the African very doubtful, that of America imaginary, or rather the effect of naturalization.

Angular Luffa—Luffa acutangula, Roxburgh.

The origin of this species, cultivated like the preceding one in all tropical countries, is not very clear, according to Naudin and Cogniaux.1336 The first gives Senegal, the second Asia, and, doubtfully, Africa. It is hardly necessary to say that Linnæus1337 was mistaken in indicating Tartary and China. Clarke, in Sir Joseph Hooker’s flora, says without hesitation that it is indigenous in British India. Rheede1338 formerly saw the plant in sandy soil in Malabar. Its natural area seems to be limited, for Thwaites in Ceylon, Kurz in British Burmah, and Loureiro in China and Cochin-China,1339 only give the species as cultivated, or growing on rubbish-heaps near gardens. Rumphius1340 calls it a Bengal plant. No luffa has been long cultivated in China, according to a letter of Dr. Bretschneider. No Sanskrit name is known. All these are indications of a comparatively recent culture in Asia.

A variety with bitter fruit is common in British India1341 in a wild state, since there is no inducement to cultivate it. It exists also in the Sunda Islands. It is Luffa amara, Roxburgh, and L. sylvestris, Miquel. L. subangulata, Miquel, is another variety which grows in Java, which M. Cogniaux also unites with the others from authentic specimens which he saw.

M. Naudin does not say what traveller gives the plant as wild in Senegambia; but he says the negroes call it papengaye, and as this is the name of the Mauritius planters,1342 it is probable that the plant is cultivated in Senegal, and perhaps naturalized near dwellings. Sir Joseph Hooker, in the Flora of Tropical Africa, gives the species, but without proof that it is wild in Africa, and Cogniaux is still more brief. Schweinfurth and Ascheron1343 do not mention it either as wild or cultivated in Egypt, Nubia, and Abyssinia. There is no trace of its ancient cultivation in Egypt.

The species has often been sent from the West Indies, New Granada, Brazil, and other parts of America, but there is no indication that it has been long in these places, nor even that it occurs at a distance from gardens in a really wild state.

The conditions or probabilities of origin, and of date of culture, are, it will be seen, identical for the two cultivated species of luffa. In support of the hypothesis that the latter is not of African origin, I may say that the four other species of the genus are Asiatic or American; and as a sign that the cultivation of the luffa is not very ancient, I will add that the form of the fruit varies much less than in the other cultivated cucurbitacea.

Snake Gourd—Trichosanthes anguina, Linnæus.

An annual creeping Cucurbitacea, remarkable for its fringed corolla. It is called petole in Mauritius, from a Java name. The fruit, which is something like a long fleshy pod of some leguminous plants, is eaten cooked like a cucumber in tropical Asia.

As the botanists of the seventeenth century received the plant from China, they imagined that the plant was indigenous there, but it was probably cultivated. Dr. Bretschneider1344 tells us that the Chinese name, mankua, means “cucumber of the southern barbarians.” Its home must be India, or the Indian Archipelago. No author, however, asserts that it has been found in a distinctly wild state. Thus Clarke, in Hooker’s Flora of British India, ii. p. 610, says only, “India, cultivated.” Naudin,1345 before him, said, “Inhabits the East Indies, where it is much cultivated for its fruits. It is rarely found wild.” Rumphius1346 is not more positive for Amboyna. Loureiro and Kurz in Cochin-China and Burmah, Blume and Miquel in the islands to the south of Asia, have only seen the plant cultivated. The thirty-nine other species of the genus are all of the old world, found between China or Japan, the west of India and Australia. They belong especially to India and the Malay Archipelago. I consider the Indian origin as the most probable one.

The species has been introduced into Mauritius, where it sows itself round cultivated places. Elsewhere it is little diffused. No Sanskrit name is known.

Chayote, or Choco—Sechium edule Swartz.

This plant, of the order Cucurbitaceæ, is cultivated in tropical America for its fruits, shaped like a pear, and tasting like a cucumber. They contain only one seed, so that the flesh is abundant.

The species alone constitutes the genus Sechium. There are specimens in every herbarium, but generally collectors do not indicate whether they are naturalized, or really wild, and apparently indigenous in the country. Without speaking of works in which this plant is said to come from the East Indies, which is entirely a mistake, several of the best give Jamaica1347 as the original home. However, P. Browne,1348 in the middle of the last century, said positively that it was cultivated there, and Sloane does not mention it. Jacquin1349 says that it “inhabits Cuba, and is cultivated there,” and Richard copies this phrase in the flora of R. de La Sagra without adding any proof. Naudin says,1350 “a Mexican plant,” but he does not give his reasons for asserting this. Cogniaux,1351 in his recent monograph, mentions a great number of specimens gathered from Brazil to the West Indies without saying if he had seen any one of these given as wild. Seemann1352 saw the plant cultivated at Panama, and he adds a remark, important if correct, namely, that the name chayote, common in the isthmus, is the corruption of an Aztec word, chayotl. This is an indication of an ancient existence in Mexico, but I do not find the word in Hernandez, the classic author on the Mexican plants anterior to the Spanish conquest. The chayote was not cultivated in Cayenne ten years ago.1353 Nothing indicates an ancient cultivation in Brazil. The species is not mentioned by early writers, such as Piso and Marcgraf, and the name chuchu, given as Brazilian,1354 seems to me to come from chocho, the Jamaica name, which is perhaps a corruption of the Mexican word.

The plant is probably a native of the south of Mexico and of Central America, and was transported into the West India Islands and to Brazil in the eighteenth century. The species was afterwards introduced into Mauritius and Algeria, where it is very successful.1355

Indian Fig, or Prickly Pear—Opuntia ficus indica, Miller.

This fleshy plant of the Cactus family, which produces the fruit known in the south of Europe as the Indian fig, has no connection with the fig tree, nor has the fruit with the fig. Its origin is not Indian but American. Everything is erroneous and absurd in this common name. However, since Linnæus took his botanical name from it, Cactus ficus indica, afterwards connected with the genus Opuntia, it was necessary to retain the specific name to avoid changes which are a source of confusion, and to recall the popular denomination. The prickly forms, and those more or less free from spines, have been considered by some authors as distinct species, but an attentive examination leads us to regard them as one.1356

The species existed both wild and cultivated in Mexico before the arrival of the Spaniards. Hernandez1357 describes nine varieties of it, which shows the antiquity of its cultivation. The cochineal insect appears to feed on one of these, almost without thorns, more than on the others, and it has been transported with the plant to the Canary Isles and elsewhere. It is not known how far its habitat extended in America before man transported pieces of the plant, shaped like a racket, and the fruits, which are two easy ways of propagating it. Perhaps the wild plants in Jamaica, and the other West India Islands mentioned by Sloane,1358 in 1725, were the result of its introduction by the Spaniards. Certainly the species has become naturalized in this direction as far as the climate permits; for instance, as far as Southern Florida.1359