Origin of Cultivated Plants

Pear—Pyrus communis, Linnæus.

The pear grows wild over the whole of temperate Europe and Western Asia, particularly in Anatolia, to the south of the Caucasus and in the north of Persia,[1141 - Ledebour, Fl. Ross., ii. p. 94; Boissier, Fl. Orient., ii. p. 653. He has verified several specimens.] perhaps even in Kashmir,[1142 - Sir J. Hooker, Fl. Brit. Ind., ii. p. 374.] but this is very doubtful. Some authors hold that its area extends as far as China. This opinion is due to the fact that they regard Pyrus sinensis, Lindley, as belonging to the same species. An examination of the leaves alone, of which the teeth are covered with a fine silky down, convinced me of the specific difference of the two trees.[1143 - P. sinensis described by Lindley is badly drawn with regard to the indentation of the leaves in the plate in the Botanical Register, and very well in that of Decaisne’s Jardin Fruitier du Muséum. It is the same species as P. ussuriensis, Maximowicz, of Eastern Asia.]

Our wild pear does not differ much from some of the cultivated varieties. Its fruit is sour, spotted, and narrowing towards the stalk, or nearly spherical on the same tree.[1144 - Well drawn in Duhamel, Traité des Arbres, edit. 2, vi. pl. 59; and in Decaisne, Jard. Frui. du Mus., pl. 1, figs. B and C. P. balansæ, pl. 6 of the same work, appears to be identical, as Boissier observes.] With many other cultivated species, it is hard to distinguish the individuals of wild origin from those which the chance transport of seeds has produced at a distance from dwellings. In the present case it is not difficult. Pear trees are often found in woods, and they attain to a considerable height, with all the conditions of fertility of an indigenous plant.[1145 - This is the case in the forests of Lorraine, for instance, according to the observations of Godron, De l’Origine Probable des Poiriers Cultivés, 8vo pamphlet, 1873, p. 6.] Let us examine, however, whether in the wide area they occupy a less ancient existence may be suspected in some countries than in others.

No Sanskrit name for the pear is known, whence it may be concluded that its cultivation is of no long standing in the north-west of India, and that the indication, which is moreover very vague, of wild trees in Kashmir is of no importance. Neither are there any Hebrew or Aramaic names,[1146 - Rosenmüller, Bibl. Alterth.; Löw, Aramaeische Pflanzennamen, 1881.] but this is explained by the fact that the pear does not flourish in the hot countries in which these tongues were spoken.

Homer, Theophrastus, and Dioscorides mention the pear tree under the names ochnai, apios, or achras. The Latins called it pyrus or pirus,[1147 - The spelling Pyrus, adopted by Linnæus, occurs in Pliny, Historia, edit. 1631, p. 301. Some botanists, purists in spelling, write pirus, so that in referring to a modern work it is necessary to look in the index for both forms, or run the risk of believing that the pears are not in the work. In any case the ancient name was a common name; but the true botanical name is that of Linnæus, founder of the received nomenclature, and Linnæus wrote Pyrus.] and cultivated a great number of varieties, at least in Pliny’s time. The mural paintings at Pompeii frequently represent the tree with its fruit.[1148 - Comes, Ill. Piante nei Dipinti Pompeiani, p. 59.]

The lake-dwellers of Switzerland and Italy gathered wild apples in great quantities, and among their stores pears are sometimes, but rarely, found. Heer has given an illustration of one which cannot be mistaken, found at Wangen or Robenhausen. It is a fruit narrowing towards the stalk, 28 mm. (about an inch and a half) long by 19 mm. (an inch) wide, cut longitudinally so as to show the small quantity of pulp as compared to the cartilaginous central part.[1149 - Heer, Pfahlbauten, pp. 24, 26, fig. 7.] None have been found in the lake-dwellings of Bourget in Savoy. In those of Lombardy, Professor Raggazzoni[1150 - Sordelli, Notizie Stat. Lacustre di Lagozza.] found a pear cut lengthways, 25 mm. by 16. This was at Bardello, Lago di Varese. The wild pears figured in Duhamel, Traité des Arbres, edit. 2, are 30 to 33 by 30 to 32 mm.; and those of Laristan, figured in the Jardin Fruitier du Muséum under the name P. balansæ, which seem to me to be of the same species, and undoubtedly wild, are 26 to 27 mm. by 24 to 25. In modern wild pears the fleshy part is a little thicker, but the ancient lake-dwellers dried their fruits after cutting them lengthways, which must have caused them to shrink a little. No knowledge of metals or of hemp is shown in the settlements where these were found; but, considering their distance from the more civilized centres of antiquity, especially in the case of Switzerland, it is possible that these remains are not more ancient than the Trojan war, or than the foundation of Rome.

I have mentioned three Greek and one Roman name, but there are many others; for instance, pauta in Armenian and Georgian; vatzkor in Hungarian; in Slav languages gruscha (Russian), hrusska (Bohemian), kruska (Illyrian). Names similar to the Latin pyrus recur in the Keltic languages; peir in Erse, per in Kymric and Armorican.[1151 - Nemnich, Polyglott. Lex. Naturgesch.; Ad. Pictet, Origines Indo-Europ., i. p. 277; and my manuscript dictionary of common names.] I leave philologists to conjecture the Aryan origin of some of these names, and of the German Birn; I merely note their number and diversity as an indication of the very ancient existence of the species from the Caspian Sea to the Atlantic. The Aryans certainly did not carry pears nor pear pips with them in their wanderings westward; but if they found in Europe a fruit they knew, they would have given it the name or names they were accustomed to use, while other earlier names may have survived in some countries. As an example of the latter case, I may mention two Basque names, udarea and madaria,[1152 - From a list of plant-names sent by M. d’Abadie to Professor Clos, of Toulouse.] which have no analogy with any known European or Asiatic name. The Basques being probably the descendants of the conquered Iberians who were driven back to the Pyrenees by the Kelts, the antiquity of their language is very great, and it is clear that their names for the species in question were not derived from Keltic or Latin.

The modern area of the pear extending from the north of Persia to the western coast of temperate Europe, principally in mountainous regions, may therefore be considered as prehistoric, and anterior to all cultivation. It must be added, however, that in the north of Europe and in the British Isles an extensive cultivation must have extended and multiplied naturalizations in comparatively modern times which can scarcely be now distinguished.

I cannot accept Godron’s hypothesis that the numerous cultivated varieties come from an unknown Asiatic species.[1153 - Godron, ubi supra, p. 28.] It seems that they may be ranked, as Decaisne says, either with P. communis or P. nivalis of which I am about to speak, taking into account the effect of accidental crossing, of cultivation, and of long-continued selection. Besides, Western Asia has been explored so thoroughly that it is probable it contains no other species than those already described.

Snow Pear—Pyrus nivalis, Jacquin.

This variety of pear is cultivated in Austria, in the north of Italy, and in several departments of the east and centre of France. It was named Pyrus nivalis by Jacquin[1154 - Jacquin, Flora Austriaca, ii. pp. 4, 107.] from the German name Schneebirne, given to it because the Austrian peasants eat the fruit when the snow is on the ground. It is called in France Poirier sauger, because the under side of the leaves is covered with a white down which makes them like the sage (Fr. sauge). Decaisne[1155 - Decaisne, Jardin Fruitier du Muséum, Poiriers, pl. 21.] considered all the varieties of P. nivalis to be derived from P. kotschyana, Boissier,[1156 - Decaisne, ibid., p. 18, and Introduction, p. 30. Several varieties of this species, of which a few bear a large fruit, are figured in the same work.] which grows wild in Asia Minor. The latter in this case should take the name of nivalis, which is the older.

The snowy pears cultivated in France to make the drink called perry have become wild in the woods here and there.[1157 - Boreau, Fl. du Centre de la France, edit. 3, vol. ii. p. 236.] They constitute the greater number of the so-called “cider pears,” which are distinguished by the sour taste of the fruit independent of the character of the leaf. The descriptions of the Greeks and Romans are too imperfect for us to be certain if they possessed this species. It may be presumed that they did, however, since they made cider.[1158 - Palladius, De re Rustica, lib. 3, c. 25. For this purpose “pira sylvestria vel asperi generis” were used.]

Sandy Pear, Chinese Pear—Pyrus sinensis, Lindley.[1159 - The Chinese quince had been called by Thonin Pyrus sinensis. Lindley has unfortunately given the same name to a true pyrus.]

I have already mentioned this species, which is nearly allied to the common pear. It is wild in Mongolia and Mantchuria,[1160 - Decaisne (Jardin Fruitier du Muséum, Poiriers, pl. 5) saw specimens from both countries. Franchet and Savatier give it as only cultivated in Japan.] and cultivated in China and Japan. Its fruit, large rather than good, is used for preserving. It has also been recently introduced into European gardens for experiments in crossing it with our species. This will very likely take place naturally.

Apple—Pyrus Malus, Linnæus.

The apple tree grows wild throughout Europe (excepting in the extreme north), in Anatolia, the south of the Caucasus, and the Persian province of Ghilan.[1161 - Nyman, Conspectus Floræ Europeæ, p. 240; Ledebour, Flora Rossica, ii. p. 96; Boissier, Flora Orientalis, ii. p. 656; Decaisne, Nouv. Arch. Mus., x. p. 153.] Near Trebizond, the botanist Bourgeau saw quite a small forest of them.[1162 - Boissier, ibid.] In the mountains of the north-west of India it is “apparently wild,” as Sir Joseph Hooker writes in his Flora of British India. No author mentions it as growing in Siberia, in Mongolia, or in Japan.[1163 - Maximowicz, Prim. Ussur.; Regel, Opit. Flori, etc., on the plants of the Ussuri collected by Maak; Schmidt, Reisen Amur. Franchet and Savatier do not mention it in their Enum. Jap. Bretschneider quotes a Chinese name which, he says, applies also to other species.]

There are two varieties wild in Germany, the one with glabrous leaves and ovaries, the other with leaves downy on the under side, and Koch adds that this down varies considerably.[1164 - Koch, Syn. Fl. Germ., i. p. 261.] In France accurate authors also give two wild varieties, but with characters which do not tally exactly with those of the German flora.[1165 - Boreau, Fl. du Centre de la France, edit. 3, vol. ii. p. 236.] It would be easy to account for this difference if the wild trees in certain districts spring from cultivated varieties whose seeds have been accidentally dispersed. The question is, therefore, to discover to what degree the species is probably ancient and indigenous in different countries, and, if it is not more ancient in one country than another, how it was gradually extended by the accidental sowing of forms changed by the crossing of varieties and by cultivation.

The country in which the apple appears to be most indigenous is the region lying between Trebizond and Ghilan. The variety which there grows wild has leaves downy on the under side, short peduncles, and sweet fruit,[1166 - Boissier, ubi supra.] like Malus communis of France, described by Boreau. This indicates that its prehistoric area extended from the Caspian Sea nearly to Europe.

Piddington gives in his Index a Sanskrit name for the apple, but Adolphe Pictet[1167 - Orig. Indo-Eur., i. p. 276.] informs us that this name seba is Hindustani, and comes from the Persian sêb, sêf. The absence of an earlier name in India argues that the now common cultivation of the apple in Kashmir and Thibet, and especially that in the north-west and central provinces of India, is not very ancient. The tree was probably known only to the western Aryans.

This people had in all probability a name of which the root was ab, af, av, ob, as this root recurs in several European names of Aryan origin. Pictet gives aball, ubhall, in Erse; afal in Kymric; aval in Armorican; aphal in old High German; appel in old English; apli in Scandinavian; obolys in Lithuanian; iabluko in ancient Slav; iabloko in Russian. It would appear from this that the western Aryans, finding the apple wild or already naturalized in the north of Europe, kept the name under which they had known it. The Greeks had mailea or maila, the Latins malus, malum, words whose origin, according to Pictet, is very uncertain. The Albanians, descendants of the Pelasgians, have molé.[1168 - Heldreich, Nutzpflanzen Griechenlands, i. p. 64.] Theophrastus[1169 - Theophrastus, De Causis, lib. 6, cap. 24.] mentions wild and cultivated maila. Lastly, the Basques (ancient Iberians) have an entirely different name, sagara, which implies an existence in Europe prior to the Aryan invasions.

The inhabitants of the terra-mare of Parma, and of the palafittes of the lakes of Lombardy, Savoy, and Switzerland, made great use of apples. They always cut them lengthways, and preserved them dried as a provision for the winter. The specimens are often carbonized by fire, but the internal structure of the fruit is only the more clearly to be distinguished. Heer,[1170 - Heer, Pfahlbauten, p. 24, figs. 1-7.] who has shown great penetration in observing these details, distinguishes two varieties of the apple known to the inhabitants of the lake-dwellings before they possessed metals. The smaller kind are 15 to 24 mm. in their longitudinal diameter, and about 3 mm. more across (in their dried and carbonized state); the larger, 29 to 32 mm. lengthways by 36 wide (dried, but not carbonized). The latter corresponds to an apple of German-Swiss orchards, now called campaner. The English wild apple, figured in English Botany, pl. 179, is 17 mm. long by 22 wide. It is possible that the little apples of the lake-dwellings were wild; however, their abundance in the stores makes it doubtful. Dr. Gross sent me two apples from the more recent palafittes of Lake Neuchâtel; the one is 17 the other 22 mm. in longitudinal diameter. At Lagozza, in Lombardy, Sordelli[1171 - Sordelli, Sulle Piante della Stazione di Lagozza, p. 35.] mentions two apples, the one 17 mm. by 19, the other 19 mm. by 27. In a prehistoric deposit of Lago Varese, at Bardello, Ragazzoni found an apple in the stores a little larger than the others.

From all these facts, I consider the apple to have existed in Europe, both wild and cultivated, from prehistoric times. The lack of communication with Asia before the Aryan invasion makes it probable that the tree was indigenous in Europe as in Anatolia, the south of the Caucasus, and Northern Russia, and that its cultivation began early everywhere.

Quince—Cydonia vulgaris, Persoon.

The quince grows wild in the woods in the north of Persia, near the Caspian Sea, in the region to the south of the Caucasus, and in Anatolia.[1172 - Boissier, Fl. Orient., ii. p. 656; Ledebour, Fl. Ross., ii. p. 55.] A few botanists have also found it apparently wild in the Crimea, and in the north of Greece;[1173 - Steven, Verzeichniss Taurien, p. 150; Sibthorp, Prodr. Fl. Græcæ, i. p. 344.] but naturalization may be suspected even in the east of Europe, and the further we advance towards Italy, especially towards the south-west of Europe and Algeria, the more it becomes probable that the species was naturalized at an early period round villages, in hedges, etc.

No Sanskrit name is known for the quince, whence it may be inferred that its area did not extend towards the centre of Asia. Neither is there any Hebrew name, though the species is wild upon Mount Taurus.[1174 - Boissier, ibid.] The Persian name is haivah,[1175 - Nemnich, Polyglott Lexicon.] but I do not know whether it is as old as Zend. The same name, aiva, exists in Russian for the cultivated quince, while the name of the wild plant is armud, from the Armenian armuda.[1176 - Nemnich, Poly. Lex.] The Greeks grafted upon a common variety, strution, a superior kind, which came from Cydon, in Crete, whence κυδωνιον, translated by the Latin malum cotoneum, by cydonia, and all the European names, such as codogno in Italian, coudougner, and later coing in French, quitte in German, etc. There are Polish, pigwa, Slav, tunja,[1177 - Ibid.] and Albanian (Pelasgian?), ftua,[1178 - Heldreich, Nutz. Griech., p. 64.] names which differ entirely from the others. This variety of names points to an ancient knowledge of the species to the west of its original country, and the Albanian name may even indicate an existence prior to the Hellenes.

Its antiquity in Greece may also be gathered from the superstition, mentioned by Pliny and Plutarch, that the fruit of the quince was a preservation from evil influences, and from its entrance into the marriage rites prescribed by Solon. Some authors go so far as to maintain that the apple disputed by Hera, Aphrodite, and Athene was a quince. Those who are interested in such questions will find details in Comes’s paper on the plants represented in the frescoes at Pompeii.[1179 - In 4to, Napoli, 1879.] The quince tree is figured twice in these, which is not surprising, as the tree was known in Cato’s time.[1180 - De re Rustica, lib. 7, cap. 2.]

It seems to me probable that it was naturalized in the east of Europe before the epoch of the Trojan war. The quince is a fruit which has been little modified by cultivation; it is as harsh and acid when fresh as in the time of the ancient Greeks.

Pomegranate—Punica granatum, Linnæus.

The pomegranate grows wild in stony ground in Persia, Kurdistan, Afghanistan, and Beluchistan.[1181 - Boissier, Fl. Orient., ii. p. 737; Sir J. Hooker, Fl. of Brit. Ind., ii. p. 581.] Burnes saw groves of it in Mazanderan, to the south of the Caspian Sea.[1182 - Quoted from Royle, Illus. Himal., p. 208.] It appears equally wild to the south of the Caucasus.[1183 - Ledebour, Fl. Ross., ii. p. 104.] Westwards, that is to say, in Asia Minor, in Greece, and in the Mediterranean basin generally, in the north of Africa and in Madeira, the species appears rather to have become naturalized from cultivation, and by the dispersal of the seeds by birds. Many floras of the south of Europe speak of it as a “subspontaneous” or naturalized species. Desfontaines, in his Atlantic Flora, gives it as wild in Algeria, but subsequent authors think[1184 - Munby, Fl. Alger., p. 49; Spicilegium Flora Maroccanæ, p. 458.] rather it is naturalized.[1185 - Boissier, ibid.] I doubt its being wild in Beluchistan, where the traveller Stocks found it, for Anglo-Indian botanists do not allow it to be indigenous east of the Indus, and I note the absence of the species in the collections from Lebanon and Syria which Boissier is always careful to quote.

In China the pomegranate exists only as a cultivated plant. It was introduced from Samarkhand by Chang-Kien, a century and a half before the Christian era.[1186 - Bretschneider, On Study and Value, etc., p. 16.]

The naturalization in the Mediterranean basin is so general that it may be termed an extension of the original area. It probably dates from a very remote period, for the cultivation of the species dates from a very early epoch in Western Asia.

Let us see whether historical and philological data can give us any information on this head.

I note the existence of a Sanskrit name, darimba, whence several modern Indian names are derived.[1187 - Piddington, Index.] Hence we may conclude that the species had long been known in the regions traversed by the Aryans in their route towards India. The pomegranate is mentioned several times in the Old Testament, under the name of rimmon,[1188 - Rosenmüller, Bibl. Naturge., i. p. 273; Hamilton, La Bot. de la Bible, Nice, 1871, p. 48.] whence the Arabic rumman or rûman. It was one of the fruit trees of the promised land, and the Hebrews had learnt to appreciate it in Egyptian gardens. Many localities in Palestine took their name from this shrub, but the Scriptures only mention it as a cultivated species. The flower and the fruit figured in the religious rites of the Phœnicians, and the goddess Aphrodite had herself planted it in the isle of Cyprus,[1189 - Hehn, Kultur und Hausthiere aus Asien, edit. 3, p. 106.] which implies that it was not indigenous there. The Greeks were acquainted with the species in the time of Homer. It is twice mentioned in the Odyssey as a tree in the gardens of Phæacia and Phrygia. They called it roia or roa, which philologists believe to be derived from the Syrian and Hebrew name,[1190 - Hehn, ibid.] and also sidai,[1191 - Lenz, Bot. der Alten Grie. und Röm., p. 681.] which seems to be Pelasgic, for the modern Albanian name is sige.[1192 - Heldreich, Die Nutzpflanzen Griechenlands, p. 64.] There is nothing to show that the species was wild in Greece, where Fraas and Heldreich affirm that it is now only naturalized.[1193 - Fraas, Fl. Class., p. 79; Heldreich, ibid.]

The pomegranate enters into the myths and religious ceremonies of the ancient Romans.[1194 - Hehn, ibid.] Cato speaks of its properties as a vermifuge. According to Pliny,[1195 - Pliny, lib. 13, c. 19.] the best pomegranates came from Carthage, hence the name Malum punicum; but it should not be supposed, as it has been assumed, that the species came originally from Northern Africa. Very probably the Phœnicians had introduced it at Carthage long before the Romans had anything to do with this town, and it was doubtless cultivated as in Egypt.

If the pomegranate had formerly been wild in Northern Africa and the south of Europe, the Latins would have had more original names for it than granatum (from granum and Malum punicum. We should have perhaps found local names derived from ancient Western tongues; whereas the Semitic name rimmon has prevailed in Greek and in Arabic, and even occurs, through Arab influence, among the Berbers.[1196 - Dictionnaire Français-Berbère, published by the French Government.] It must be admitted that the African origin is one of the errors caused by the erroneous popular nomenclature of the Romans.

Leaves and flowers of a pomegranate, described by Saporta[1197 - De Saporta, Bull. Soc. Géol. de France, April 5, 1869, pp. 767-769.] as a variety of the modern Punica granatum, have been discovered in the pliocene strata of the environs of Meximieux. The species, therefore, existed under this form, before our epoch, along with several species, some extinct, others still existing in the south of Europe, and others in the Canaries, but the continuity of existence down to our own day is not thereby proved.

To conclude, botanical, historical, and philological data agree in showing that the modern species is a native of Persia and some adjacent countries. Its cultivation began in prehistoric time, and its early extension, first towards the west and afterwards into China, has caused its naturalization in cases which may give rise to errors as to its true origin, for they are frequent, ancient, and enduring. I arrived at these conclusions in 1869,[1198 - Géogr. Bot. Rais., p. 191.] which has not prevented the repetition of the erroneous African origin in several works.

Rose Apple—Eugenia Jambos, Linnæus; Jambosa vulgaris, de Candolle.

This small tree belongs to the family of Myrtaceæ. It is cultivated in tropical regions of the old and new worlds, as much perhaps for the beauty of its foliage as for its fruit, of which the rose-scented pulp is too scanty. There is an excellent illustration and a good description of it in the Botanical Magazine, pl. 3356. The seed is poisonous.[1199 - Descourtilz, Flore Médicale des Antilles, v. pl. 315.]

As the cultivation of this species is of ancient date in Asia, there was no doubt of its Asiatic origin; but the locality in which it grew wild was formerly unknown. Loureiro’s assertion that it grew in Cochin-China and some parts of India required confirmation, which has been afforded by some modern writers.[1200 - Miquel, Sumatra, p. 118; Flora Indiæ-Batavæ, i. p. 425; Blume, Museum Lugd. – Bat., i. p. 93.] The jambos is wild in Sumatra, and elsewhere in the islands of the Malay Archipelago. Kurz did not meet with it in the forests of British Burmah, but when Rheede saw this tree in gardens in Malabar he noticed that it was called Malacca-schambu, which shows that it came originally from the Malay Peninsula. Lastly, Brandis says it is wild in Sikkim, to the north of Bengal. Its natural area probably extends from the islands of the Malay Archipelago to Cochin-China, and even to the north-east of India, where, however, it is probably naturalized from cultivation and by the agency of birds. Naturalization has also taken place elsewhere – at Hong-kong, for instance, in the Seychelles, Mauritius, and Rodriguez, and in several of the West India Islands.[1201 - Hooker, Fl. Brit. Ind., ii. p. 474; Baker, Fl. of Maurit., etc., p. 115; Grisebach, Fl. of Brit. W. Ind. Isles, p. 235.]

Malay Apple—Eugenia malaccensis, Linnæus; Jambosa malaccensis, de Candolle.

A species allied to Eugenia jambos, but differing from it in the arrangement of its flowers, and in its fruit, of an obovoid instead of ovoid form; that is to say, the smaller end is attached to the stalk. The fruit is more fleshy and is also rose-scented, but it is much[1202 - Rumphius, Amboin, i. p. 121, t. 37.] or little[1203 - Tussac, Flore des Antilles, iii. p. 89, pl. 25.] esteemed according to the country and varieties. These are numerous, differing in the red or pink colour of the flowers, and in the size, shape, and colour of the fruit.

The numerous varieties show an ancient cultivation in the Malay Archipelago, where the species is indigenous. In confirmation, it must be noted that Forster found it established in the Pacific Islands, from Otahiti to the Sandwich Isles, at the time of Cook’s voyages.[1204 - Forster, Plantis Esculentis, p. 36.] The Malay apple grows wild in the forests of the Malay Archipelago, and in the peninsula of Malacca.[1205 - Blume, Museum Lugd. – Bat., i. p. 91; Miquel, Fl. Indiæ-Batav., i. p. 411; Hooker, Flora of British India, ii. p. 472.]

Tussac says that it was brought to Jamaica from Otahiti in 1793. It has spread and become naturalized in several of the West India Islands, also in Mauritius and the Seychelles.[1206 - Grisebach, Fl. Brit. W. Indies, p. 235; Baker, Fl. of Mauritius, p. 115.]

Guava—Psidium guayava, Raddi.

Ancient authors, Linnæus, and some later botanists, admitted two species of this fruit tree of the family of Myrtaceæ, the one with elliptical or spherical fruit, with red flesh, Psidium pomiferum; the other with a pyriform fruit and white or pink flesh, more agreeable to the taste. Such diversity is also observed in pears, apples, or peaches; so it was decided to consider all the Psidii as forming a single species. Raddi saw a proof that there was no essential difference, for he observed pyriform and round fruits growing on the same tree in Brazil.[1207 - Raddi, Di Alcune Specie di Pero Indiano, in 4to, Bologna, 1821, p. 1.] The majority of botanists, especially those who have observed the guava in the colonies, follow the opinion of Raddi,[1208 - Martius, Syst. Nat. Medicæ Bras., p. 32; Blume, Museum Lugd. – Bat., i. p. 71; Hasskarl, in Flora, 1844, p. 589; Sir J. Hooker, Fl. of Brit. Ind., ii. p 468.] to which I was inclined, even in 1855, from reasons drawn from the geographical distribution.[1209 - Géogr. Bot. Rais., p. 893.]

Lowe,[1210 - Lowe, Flora of Madeira, p. 266.] in his Flora of Madeira, maintains with some hesitation the distinction into two species, and asserts that each can be raised from seed. They are, therefore, races like those of our domestic animals, and of many cultivated plants. Each of these races comprehends several varieties.[1211 - See Blume, ibid.; Descourtilz, Flore Médicale des Antilles, ii. p. 20, in which there is a good illustration of the pyriform guava. Tussac, Flore des Antilles, gives a good plate of the round form. These two latter works furnish interesting details on the use of the guava, on the vegetation of the species, etc.]

The study of the origin of the guava presents in the highest degree the difficulty which exists in the case of many fruit trees of this nature: their fleshy and somewhat aromatic fruits attract omnivorous animals which cast their seeds in places far from cultivation. Those of the guava germinate rapidly, and fructify in the third or fourth year. Its area has thus spread, and is still spreading by naturalization, principally in those tropical countries which are neither very hot nor very damp.

In order to simplify the search after the origin of the species, I may begin by eliminating the old world, for it is sufficiently evident that the guava came from America. Out of sixty species of the genus Psidium, all those which have been carefully studied are American. It is true that botanists from the sixteenth century have found plants of Psidium guayava (varieties pomiferum and pyriferum) more or less wild in the Malay Archipelago and the south of Asia,[1212 - Rumphius, Amboin, i. p. 141; Rheede, Hortus Malabariensis, iii. t. 34.] but everything tends to show that these were the result of recent naturalization. In each locality a foreign origin was admitted; the only doubt was whether this origin was Asiatic or American. Other considerations justify this idea. The common names in Malay are derived from the American word guiava. Ancient Chinese authors do not mention the guava, though Loureiro said a century and a half ago that they were growing wild in Cochin-China. Forster does not mention them among the cultivated plants of the Pacific Isles at the time of Cook’s voyage, which is significant when we consider how easy this plant is to cultivate and its ready dispersion. In Mauritius and the Seychelles there is no doubt of their recent introduction and naturalization.[1213 - Bojer, Hortus Mauritianus; Baker, Flora of Mauritius, p. 112.]

It is more difficult to discover from what part of America the guava originally came. In the present century it is undoubtedly wild in the West Indies, in Mexico, in Central America, Venezuela, Peru, Guiana, and Brazil.[1214 - All the floras, and Berg in Flora Brasiliensis, vol. xiv. p. 196.] But whether this is only since Europeans extended its cultivation, or whether it was previously diffused by the agency of the natives and of birds, seems to be no more certain than when I spoke on the subject in 1855.[1215 - Géogr. Bot. Rais., p. 894.] Now, however, with a little more experience in questions of this nature, and since the specific unity of the two varieties of guava is recognized, I shall endeavour to show what seems most probable.