North Iowa times. [volume] (McGregor, Iowa) 1867-current, 1870-05-11
Our Vegetables.

thiuSs III the vegetable WOrlQ are fa6c De
coming cosmopolitan, it is interesting to
trace the nationality of some of the most
familiar things in daily fare. Seldom,
while muching our matutinal radish, do
we pause to conjure an imaginary bed of
buried crimson and white in the far lands
Of Fang-Chou and -Wampi; yet
from China and Japan were the first Rad
ishes introduced to the outside barbarians
Of Europe. Neither, at supper, in meet
ing with peculiarly favorous morsel in
our cake, do we inwardly thank the homo
Of Demosthenes for the luxury yet the
earliest citron groves breathed their per-
fume on the sunny Grecian ether. Our
ounces, hanging from crooked, crowded
limbs, the most neglected of all our lux
uries, may be forced to stand in drunken
rows along broken. down fences, or act as
outposts to barns and out houses but the
great-great~grandmother Of all the ounces
was plucky little tree of high station,
looked up to by sweet-scented, shrubs in
the Island Of Crete.
Fennel grew wild along the banks of
European rivers long before the first en-
tertainment of the "Arabian Nights" was
dreamed Of; and Celery, once known as
"sma!lage," was munched by many an
ancient Druid, let us believe, plucking it
during his solitary walks along the old
British coast. Even then, it may be, the
ducks Of an unknown continent were
munching it too, for it grows wild upon
our Chesapeake, and Delaware bays, and
our canvas-backs and their friends love to
dine upon it. But the British, as usual,
have all the credit, as it is down in their
books.
Garlic came from Sicily, where, for my
part, wish it had staid. The Caulo>rapa,
an afflicted cross between the turnip and
the cabbage, claims the Vaterland for its
own.
Beans blossomed first within sight of
the embryo mumnies, in the land of the
Sphinx; and the Eggplant first laid its
glossy treasures under an African SUM-
Peru and Chill were the first countries
enlivened by the dazzling hues of the
Nasturtian vine; and Southern Europe
gave us the artichoke and the beet.
To Persia we stand indebted for peaches,
walnuts, mu!berries, and score of every
day luxuries and necessities; to Arabia
we owe the cultivation of spinage; and to
Southern Europe we must bow in fearful
gratitude for the horseradish.
At Siberia the victims of modern in
temperance may shake their CORY locks
forever--for from that cold, unsocial
land came rye, the father Of the great
G-e.water river which has hoated so many
jolly souls on its treacherous tides, and
engulfed so much Of humanity's treasure
The chestnut, dear to squirrels and
young America, first dropped its burrs on
an Italian soil, while its giant cousin,
yclept the Horse" is native of Thibet,
Who ever dreams, enjoying his "Ber'
gamotte," his "Flemish Beauty or his
"Jarganelle," that the first Pear-blossoms
opened within sight of the Pyramids
and what fair schoolgirl of all the pickle
eating tribe, dreams of thanking the East
Indies for her cucumbers? Apropos oil
this, once was told by worthy old lady
of Long Island, a singular item in re-
gard to the last named edible. She said
that in its wild state it grew on very lux
uriant vines that trailed in every direction
over the ground, tangling themselves
among the bushes at such rate that the
grazing animals was thereby much i'm
peded; hence, she assured me, the name,
co,c-cumber. The old lady's learning,
l admit, was generally not of the most re-
liable order, but l give her suggestion fol
what it may be worth. Probably she wat
in some way akin to that other worthy
old lady in New Jersey who, when asked
by her city nephew, why in the world shs
called certain vegetable sparrow grass,
replied, innocently:
swell, child, can't say where these
names comes from centrally, but certain
it's as plain as tbs nose on your face tina
sparrow-grass must get it's name from th'
sparrows feedin' on it SO plentiful wheI
it's in seed"
The nephew chuckled inwardly, o
course. But he, poor fellow, was ignoran
in his turn for he didn't know that As
paragus was first found in Russis ant
Poland and that in its wild state, al
gathered along the shores of Long Islan'
Sound and elsewhere, it is most deliciou
edible.
Parsley, that prettiest of all greens
taking SO naturally to our American sol
that it seems quite to the manner born
is only sojeurner among US. Its nativ
home is Sardinia, or rather, there it frs
secured an acquaintanceship with civilized
man. Onions, too, are only naturalize'
foreigners in America. / had hoped tha
in poetic justice research would prove thi
pathetic bull to have sprung from tn
land Of Niobe: but no; Egypt stretche
forth her withered hand and claims tn
onion as her own
Maize and potatoes, thank Heaven c:.'
mock us with no foreign pedigree. The.
are ours-ours to command, to have, AM
to hold, from times beginning to its end
ing, though England and Ireland bluste
over "corn" and "praties' till they ar
hoarse. John Bulls corn-laws take il
wide fields of waving grain of man