The Newtown bee., 1880-02-18
Origin of Potatoes, Peas and Beans.

Nobody knows precisely where the potato came from originally. It has been found apparently indigenous in many parts of the world. MT. Darwin, for instance, found it wild in the Chonos Archipelago. Sir W. J. Hooker says that it is common at Valparaiso, where it grows abundantly on the sandy hills near the sea. In Peru and other parts of South America it appears to be at home, and it is a noteworthy fact that Mir. Darwin should have noted it both in the humid forests of the Chonos Archipelago and among the central Chilian mountains, where sometimes rain does not fall for six months at a 1 streseh. It was to the colonists whom Sir Walter Raleigh sent out, in Eliza beth's reign, that we are indebted for our potatoes. Herriot, who went out with these colonists, and who wrote an account of his travels, makes what may perhaps be re- ! garded as the earliest mention of this | vegetable. Under the heading of roots" he mentions what he calls the .openawk." "These roots," he says, i, are round,- some large as a walr. :, others much larger; they grow on damp soils, some hanging together, as if fixed on ropes; they are good food either boiled or roasted" At the beginning o1 the seventeenth century Phillips says that this root was planted, as a curious exotic, in the gardens of the nobility
 but it was long ere it came into general use. Many held them to be poisonous and it would not seem altogether unrea sonably so, either. The potato is closely related to the deadly nightshadt and the mandrake, and from its stem! and leaves may be extracted a very powerful narcotic. In Burgundy the adoption of the potato as food was for ; time forbidden by the law, being deemed "a poisonous and mischievous root. Tn England prejudice against it wa
 very strong, more especially among th
 poor. It was believed to occasion dys
 entery and leprosy.
 Our garden peas are said to have com
 to us from France, and were first kEow1 as "Fulham pease, because the grounds
 about Pullman, neere London, doe brin | tIl5u IOI W WdtIu SOOhCob. IhO
 tion was probably in the reign of Henr. VIII, whose honeymoon indulgence o his brides desire for salad seems to hay . exerted a wonderful influence on Eng i, ish horticulture. In the reign of Eliza
 beth, however, they were still not grow to any great extent, though they seem t ! have been imported from Holland. Flu Ter says "they were dainties for ladies they came so far and cost so dear. Gerard says that there is one kind C
 pea indigenous to England.
 Beanss we appear to have. importe
 from Morocco, and the authority las quoted states that there is no differenc z bean, nthsss seiEafas1s to be attribute to cultivation and good soil. The kid ney bean is also not a native ol En- land
 This, we are assured, was frs. intro
 duced into this country from the Neither lands in 1509-another importation therefore, in all probability due t
 Henry's horticultural enthusiasm at tn
 time when he was 8 doting youn.
 spouse. It is curious fact that tn early introduction of the scarlet-runner , seems to have met with no little pre-
 judiced opposition, from an idea tha
 the color of the flowers was due t
 blood.-Lopdon Globe.