Dodgeville chronicle. [volume] (Dodgeville, Wis.) 1862-current, 1871-09-08
The SunfiOWer.

In the Puniaub district of India, the
sunfiower is grown in some of the
swampy regions, where malarious fever
prevails, in large plantations, with con-
siderable success and it has been found
that it's influence tends to remove the
malaria, and consequently is highly
beneficial to the health of those who
reside in these districts. A movement
for extending and advocating the Guilt
walton of this plant has been set on foot
by the Agri- horticultural Society OF the
Punjaub, which, in recent report, has
set forth many advantages likely to re-
suit from such practice. From this it
appears that the roasted seeds are used
as substitute for coffee; that the
leaves, which may be partially removed
Without injury to the seeds, forms
good fodder for cows; and that the
ashes of the stems, when burst, are
found to abound in potash. The seeds
are also of great value for fattening
poultry, besides yielding large per-
centage of oil, which is equally good for
burning or for domestic purposes. With
all these recommendations the SUM-
flower certainly deserves trial, especi-
ally as it is by no means particular as to
soil; it may be sown broadcast, or in
rows, and its cultivation is very similar
to that of Indian corn. In England,
the seeds are occasionally given TO poul-
try, and the sparrows are especially
fond of them.
In various parts of the United States
it is cultivated, chiefly on account of its
value as an oil-producer 1t is stated
Of hn
will yield, upon an average, forty
pounds of oil and after this has been
expressed, the residuum of the seeds, or
"marc," as it is called, is pressed into
oil-cake, which answers well as food for
COWS, and for fattening hogs. The
flowers are very attractive to bees, and
on this account alone sunhower cultiva-
ton has been advocated, and besides
this, cigars are manufactured from the
leaves, which are said to- be of supe-
rior pectoral quality" The leaves are
also dried and burnt to powder, after
which they are mixed with bran, and
make an excellent fodder for COWS.
Besides these applications of the sum
flower, it is stated that very sweet and
fine flour may be prepared from the
seeds, which must be previously shelled;
and that the stalk, when treated SINH
larly to flax, produces great quantity
of fine fibre. 1t is supposed that this
fine fibre enters largely into many of
the Chinese silks. These varied and
numerous uses may remind some of the
manner in which the old herbalists
used to attribute divers and often most
opposite qualities to the same plant
but there seems no reason for doubling
the veracity of the various authorities
from whom the preceding facts are
cleaned. At any rate, even supposing
that some of the recorded uses are in a
measure exaggerated, it seems plain
that the sunfower is capable of being
rendered q very useful plant, and that
its more general cultivation for utilita-
rian purposes would repay any one who
should make the experiment.
The name sunhower, as well as its
Latin equivalent, HeHamthus, refers to
the resemblance which the blossoms
present to the luminary of the day."
and more especially those representa-
tons of him which we meet with in old
books. Gerarde, who calls it "The
Flower of the Sunne, or Marigolde of
Puru," mentions that it resembles the
radiant beams of the sunne," and it was
from a similar appreciation of this re.
semblance that it was used in the re-
hgious ceremonies of the ancient SUM-
worshipping Peruvians We are told
that the virgins who officiated in the
temples of the sun, wore upon their
heads and breasts sunfowers made of
pure gold, which, rejecting the rays
of their deity by the brilliancy of the
metal, formed an effect of the most i'm
posing grandeur"
The poets, however, were not satisfied
with this sufficiently obvious interpreta-
ton of the name, and preferred to I'M
derstand it as indicating that the bios
SONS always turned toward the sun,
moving round with him in his course.
Thus Thomson speaks of
"One, the lofty follower of the sun,
Sad when he sets, shuts up her yellow leaves,
Dropping all night, and when he warm resurns.
Points her enamored bosom to his ray"
Moore's lines, in which the same idea
is expressed, are even more familiar:
The same look that she turned when he rose"
Hence it came to be regarded as an en-
blem of constancy; but its claims to
symbolic so exalted virtue cannot be
said to be founded on fact" The
French name " tournesol" was given to
the plant from a similar belief, which it
seems to have shared with two or three
other very different plants.
So far we have been speaking Of the
HeIianttuS annuuS but there is another
species, equally well known, although
perhaps not altogether recognized as
being a suntiOwer-the Jerusalem art-
choke (Helianthes ttberosus). In Eng
land this species does not blossom free
ly, although its flowers are by no means
so rare as is generally supposed. When
seen they at once show the affinity of
the plant, being very like, although
smaller than, those of the common sun
flower. 1t appears to have been known
to the Romans as an esculant plant, but
subsequently became neglected, and was
reintroduced into Europe somewhere
about the beginning of the seventeenth
century. Although a soup made from
the tubera is known as Palestine;" in
obvious reference to its name "Jerusa.
lem artichoke," it is generally under
stood that this latter has no connection
with the place so called, but is merely a
corruption of the Italian "girasole," or
sun-turner, by which term the plant was
known, and in which we trace its con-
nection with the sunfower. The Jeru
salem artichoke was brought to England
about 1917, and soon became beautiful ::
so much so, indeed, that Parkinson tells
us they were so common in his time
about London, that even the vulgar
began to desnise them - II ,,ayor o,>