Edible Plant Species

C. virginianus Pursh.
North America.
The roots are about the size of carrots, are sweet and well flavored but require a long preparation. They are eaten by the western Indians.

Coccinia indica Wight & Am. Cucurbitaceae. SCARLET-FRUITED GOURD.
Tropical Asia.
The fruit of this plant, so common in every hedge, is eaten by the natives in their curries and when fully ripe is eaten by birds.

C. moimoi M. Roem.
Tropical Arabia and Africa.
The fruit is eaten.

Coccoloba uvifera Linn. Polygonaceae. KINO. SEASIDE GRAPE.
Shores of the West Indies and neighboring portions of tropical America.
Its fruit is eatable and commonly sold in markets but is not much esteemed. As grown in India, the fruit is reddish-purple, pear-shaped, sweetish-acid and is borne in drooping racemes. The fruit consists of the fleshy perianth which encloses a solitary seed.

Cocculus cebatha DC. Menispermaceae.
A woody vine of tropical Arabia.
The ripe berries are acrid but edible, and a spirituous liquor is obtained from them.

C. limacia DC.
Eastern Asia.
The berries are acid and edible.

Cochlearia armoracia Linn. Cruciferae. HORSERADISH. RED COLE.
Europe.
This well-known condimental plant is indigenous to eastern Europe from the Caspian through Russia and Poland to Finland and is now spontaneous in the United States. Both the leaves and roots were eaten in Germany during the Middle Ages but their use was not common in England until a much later period. This plant cannot be identified with certainty with the armoracia of the Romans. If it be the armoracia of Palladius, which is a wild plant transferred to the garden, it is very curious that its use is not mentioned by Apicius in his work on cookery, of the same century. Zanonius deems horseradish to be the draba of Dioscorides. It seems to be the raphanus of Albertus Magnus, who lived in the thirteenth century; he speaks of the plant as wild and domesticated, but its culture then was probably for medicinal purposes alone, as indicated by him. Its culture in Italy, in 1563, is implied by Ruellius under the name armoracia but Castor Durante, 1617, does not describe it. In Germany, its culture as a condimental plant is mentioned by Fuchsius, 1542, and by later writers. In 1587, Dalechamp speaks of its culture in Germany but does not mention it in France. Lyte, 1586, mentions the wild plant and its uses as a condiment in England but does not imply culture. Horseradish, though known in England as red cole in 1568, is not mentioned by Turner as used in food, nor is it noticed by Boorde, 1542, in his chapter on edible roots in the Dyetary of Helth. Gerarde speaks of it as used by the Germans, and Coles, in Adam in Eden, states that the root sliced thin and mixed with vinegar is eaten as a sauce with meat as among the Germans. In the United States, horseradish is in general cultivation for market purposes. It was included by McMahon, 1806, in his list of garden esculents.

C. danica Linn.
Northern and Arctic regions.
This species is employed as a salad plant.

C. macrocarpa Waldst. & Kit.
Hungary and Transylvania.
The root may be used as a horseradish but it is less acrid.

C. officinalis Linn. SCURVY GRASS. SPOONWORT.
Arctic regions.
This species is used occasionally as a cress and is cultivated in gardens for that purpose. It is a common plant in some parts of Scotland, and Lightfoot says "it is eaten in sallads as an antiscorbutic." It serves as a scurvy grass in Alaska.

Cocos australis Mart. Palmae.
Paraguay.
This palm bears a fruit somewhat the shape and size of an acorn, with a pointed tip and is of a beautiful golden-yellow color somewhat tinged or spotted with red when ripe. At maturity, it is soft and pulpy, the flesh yellow, succulent and somewhat fibrous. The flavor is delicious, resembling that of a pineapple.

C. butyracea Linn. f. OIL PALM. WINE PALM.
South America.
This is the palma de vino of the Magdalena. This tree is cut down and a cavity excavated in its trunk near the top. In three days, this cavity is found filled with a yellowish-white juice, very limpid, with a sweet and vinous flavor. During 18 or 20 days, the palm-tree wine is daily collected; the last is less sweet but more alcoholic and more highly esteemed. One tree yields as much as 18 bottles of sap, each bottle containing 42 cubic inches, or about three and a quarter gallons.

C. coronata Mart.
Brazil.
This species yields a pith, which the Indians make into bread, and a nut from which an oil is extracted.

C. nucifera Linn. COCOANUT.
Tropics.
The centers of the geographical range of this palm are the islands and countries bordering the Indian and Pacific oceans but it is now extensively cultivated throughout the tropics. About 1330, it was described in India, and quite correctly too, under the name of nargil, by Friar Jordanus. In 1524, the cocoanut was seen by Pizarro in an Indian coast village of Peru. In the vicinity of Key West and as far north as Jupiter Inlet, the cocoanut is found, having been first introduced about 1840 by the wrecking of a vessel that threw a quantity of these nuts upon the beach. Thirty species of cocoanut are said by Simmonds to be described and named in the East. Firminger mentions ten varieties in India. Captain Cook found several sorts at Batavia. Ellis says there are many varieties in Tahiti. The nuts are much used as a food. When the embryo is unformed, the fruit furnishes sweet palm-milk, a further development supplies a white, sweet and aromatic kernel; it finally becomes still firmer and then possesses a pleasant, sweet oil. In the Fiji Islands, the kernel of the old nut is scraped, pressed through a grater, and the pulp thus formed is mixed with grasses and scented woods and suffered to stand in the sun, which causes the oil to rise to the top, when it is skimmed off. The residuum, called kora, is pounded or mashed, wrapped in banana leaves and then buried under salt water covered with piles of stones. This preparation is a common food of the natives. Toddy or palm-wine, is also made from the sap of the flowerspathes.

C. oleracea Mart. IRAIBA PALM.
Brazil.
The leaf-buds, or cabbages, are edible.

C. ventricosa Arruda.
Brazil.
The oily pulp of the fruit and the almond of the inner stone is eaten and is sold in the markets. The pith contains a fecula which is extracted in times of want and is eaten.

Codiaeum variegatum Blume. Euphorbiaceae.
India.
This species is used as a vegetable.

Coffea arabica Linn. Rubiaceae. COFFEE.
Arabia and African tropics.
This shrub is found wild in Abyssinia and in the Sudan where it forms forests. It is mentioned as seen from the mid-Niger to Sierra Leone and from the west coast to Monrovia. In the territory west of Braganza, says Livingstone, wild coffee is abundant, and the people even make their huts of coffee trees. On or about the equator, says Grant, the m'wanee, or coffee, is cultivated in considerable quantities but the berry is eaten raw as a stimulant, never drunk in an infusion by the Wanyambo. The Ugundi, says Long, never make a decoction of coffee but chew the grain raw; this is a general custom. The Unyoro, says Burton, have a plantation of coffee about almost every hut door. According to the Arabian tradition, says Krapf, the civet-cat brought the coffee-bean to the mountains of the Arusi and Ilta-Gallas, where it grew and was long cultivated, until an enterprising merchant carried the coffee plant, five hundred years ago, to Arabia where it soon became acclimated.

About the fifteenth century, writes Phillips, the use of coffee appears to have been introduced from Persia to Aden on the Red Sea. It was progressively used at Mecca, Medina, and Cairo; hence it continued its progress to Damascus and Aleppo. From these two places, it was introduced into Constantinople in the year 1554. Rauwolf, who was in the Levant in 1573, was the first European author who made any mention of coffee, but the first who has particularly described it, is Prosper Alpinus, 1591, and 1592. The Venetians seem to be the next who used coffee. This beverage was noticed by two English travellers at the beginning of the seventeenth century, Biddulph about 1603 and William Finch in 1607. Lord Bacon mentions it in 1624. M. Thevenot taught the French to drink coffee on his return from the East in 1657. It was fashionable and more widely known in Paris in 1669. Coffee is said to have been first brought to England in 1641, but Evelyn says in his diary, 1637. It was first publicly known in London in 1652. According to other accounts, the custom of drinking coffee originated with the Abyssinians, by whom the plant had been cultivated from time immemorial, and was introduced to Aden in the early part of the fifteenth century, whence its use gradually extended over Arabia. Towards the end of the seventeenth century, the Dutch transported the plant to Batavia, and thence a plant was sent to the botanic gardens at Amsterdam, where it was propagated, and in 1714 a tree was presented to Louis XIV. A tree was imported into the Isle of Bourbon in 1720. One account asserts that the French introduced it to Martinique in 1717 and another states that the Dutch had previously taken it to Surinam. It reached Jamaica in 1728. It seems certain that we are indebted to the progeny of a single plant for all the coffee now imported from Brazil and the West Indies. It was introduced to Celebes in 1822. In Java and Sumatra, the leaves of the coffee plant are used as a substitute for coffee. In 1879, four trees were known to have been grown and successfully fruited in Florida.

C. liberica Hiern. LIBERIAN COFFEE.
Tropical Africa.
This seems to be a distinct species, which furnishes the Liberian coffee. It was received in Trinidad from Kew Gardens, England, in 1875.

Coix lacryma-jobi Linn. Gramineae. JOB'S TEARS.
Tropical Asia.
The seeds may be ground to flour and made into a coarse but nourishing bread which is utilized in times of scarcity.

Cola acuminata Schott & Endl. Sterculiaceae. COLANUT. GOORANUT. KOLANUT.
Tropical Africa.
This tree, a native of tropical Africa, is cultivated in Brazil and the West Indies. Under the name of cola or kolla or gooranuts, the seeds are extensively used as a sort of condiment by the natives of western and central tropical Africa and likewise by the negroes in the West Indies and Brazil. There are several varieties. Father Carli noticed them in Congo in 1667 under the name of colla. Earth says the chief article of African produce in the Kano markets is the guro or kolanut, which forms an important article of trade and which has become to the natives as necessary as coffee or tea is to us. The nuts contain the alkaloid thein. A small piece of one of their seeds is chewed before each meal as a promoter of digestion; it is also supposed to improve the flavor of anything eaten after it or, as Father Carli says, "they have a little bitterness but the water drank after makes them very sweet. This plant was introduced into Martinique about 1836. Its" amylaceous seeds, of a not very agreeable taste, are much sought after by the negroes.

Colea telfairii Boj. Bignoniaceae.
Madagascar.
The fruit is eaten.

Coleus aromaticus Benth. Labiatae. COLEUS. COUNTRY BORAGE.
East Indies.
This is the country borage of India. Every part of the plant is delightfully fragrant, and the leaves are frequently eaten and mixed with various articles of food in India. In Burma, it is in common use as a potherb. A purple coleus was observed in cultivation in northern Japan by Miss Bird, the leaves of which are eaten as spinach.

C. barbatus Benth.
East Indies and tropical Africa.
About Bombay, this species is commonly cultivated in the gardens of the natives for the roots, which are pickled.

C. spicatus Benth.
East Indies.
Wilkinson 8 quotes Pliny as saying that the Egyptians grew this plant for making chaplets and for food.

Colocasia antiquorum Schott. Aroideae (Araceae). DASHEEN. TARO.
Tropical Asia.
This is very probably an Indian plant, as it is cultivated in the whole of central Asia in very numerous varieties and has a Sanscrit name. It was carried westward in the earliest times and is cultivated in the delta of Egypt under the name of Quolkas. Clusius, writing in 1601, had seen it in Portugal. The Spaniards are said to call it alcoleaz and to have received it from Africa. Boissier cites it as common in middle Spain. Lunan says there are several varieties cultivated in Jamaica which are preferred by the negroes to yams. In 1844, this species was cultivated by Needham Davis of South Carolina, who says one acre of rich, damp soil will produce one thousand bushels by the second year. In India, colocasias are universally cultivated and the roots are without acrimony. The tubers, says Firminger, resemble in outward appearance those of the Jerusalem artichoke. They are not in great request with Europeans in Bengal where potatoes may be had all the year through but in the Northwest Provinces, where potatoes are unobtainable during the summer months, they are much consumed in the way of a substitute. Their flavor is not unlike salsify. The plant is cultivated extensively by the Polynesians, who call it taro; the tubers are largely consumed and the young leaves are eaten as a spinach.

C. antiquorum esculenta Schott. ELEPHANT'S EAR. KALO. TARO.
This plant is largely grown in Tahiti, and Ellis says the natives have distinct names for 33 of the varieties.
Nordoff says more than 30 varieties of kalo are cultivated in the Hawaiian Islands and adds that all the kinds are acrid except one which is so mild that it may be eaten raw. Simpson says, "Kalo forms the principal food of the lower class of the Sandwich Islanders and is cultivated with great care in small enclosures kept wet." From the root a sort of paste called poi is made. Masters says it is called taro, and the rootstocks furnish a staple diet. It is also grown in the Philippines and is enumerated by Thunberg among the edible plants of Japan. In Jamaica, Sloane says the roots are eaten as potatoes, but the chief use of the vegetable, says Lunan, is as a green, and it is as delicate, wholesome, and agreeable a one as any in the world. In soup it is excellent, for such is the tenderness of the leaves that they, in a manner, dissolve and afford a rich, pleasing and mucilaginous ingredient. It is very generally cultivated in Jamaica. Adams found the boiled leaves very palatable in the Philippines but the uncooked leaves were so acrid as to be poisonous. At Hongkong, the tubers are eaten under the name of cocoas. In Europe and America it is grown as an ornamental plant.

C. indica Hassk.
Southern Asia.
This plant is cultivated in Bengal for its esculent stems and the small, pendulous tubers of its root, which are eaten by people of all ranks in their curries. Roylel says it is much cultivated about the huts of the natives. It is also cultivated in Brazil and is found in East Australia. The acridity is expelled from this plant by cooking.

Combretum butyrosum Tul. Combretaceae. BUTTER TREE.
Tropical Africa.
The Kaffirs call the fatty substance obtained from the fruit chiquito. It is largely used by them as an admixture to their food and is also exported.

Commelina angustifolia? Commelinaceae.
The rhizomes contain a good deal of starch mixed with mucilage and are therefore fit for food when cooked.

C. coelestis Willd. BLUE SPIDERWORT.
Mexico.
The rhizomes are used as food in India.

C. communis Linn.
China.
In China, this plant is much cultivated as a potherb, which is eaten in spring.

C. latifolia Hochst.
Abyssinia.
It is used as a potherb.

C. striata?
The rhizomes are suitable for food.

Comocladia integrifolia Jacq. Anacardiaceae. BURN-WOOD. MAIDEN PLUM. PAPAW-WOOD.
Tropical America.
Lunan says the fruit is eatable but not inviting. The maiden plum of the West Indies, says Morris, is grown as a fruit in the Public Gardens of Jamaica.

Conanthera bifolia Ruiz & Pav. Haemodoraceae (Tecophilaeaceae).
Chile.
The natives of the country make use of the root of this plant in their soups and it is very pleasant to the taste. Molina says the bulbs, when boiled or roasted, are an excellent food. It is called illmu. Condalia mexicana Schlecht. Rhamnaceae. Northern Mexico. The berries are similar to those of C. obovata.

C. obovata Hook. BLUE-WOOD. TEXAN LOGWOOD.
Texas.
This plant is a shrub of San Antonio, Texas and westward. The small, deep red berry is acidulous, edible and is used in jellies.

C. spathulata A. Gray.
Western Texas.
The berries are similar to those of C. obovata. Conferva sp. Confervae. Green cakes are made of the slimy river confervae in Japan, which, pressed and dried, are used as food.

Conium maculatum Linn. Umbelliferae. HERB BENNET. POISON HEMLOCK.
Europe and the Orient.
Poison hemlock has become naturalized in northeastern America from Europe. Although poisonous, says Carpenter, in the south of England, it is comparatively harmless in London and is eaten as a potherb by the peasants of Russia.

Conopodium denudatum Koch. Umbelliferae. ARNUT. EARTH CHESTNUT. JURNUT. KIPPERNUT. PIGNUT.
Western Europe.
The small, tuberous roots of this herb, when boiled or roasted, are available for food and are known as earth chestnuts. In England, says Don, the tubers are frequently dug and eaten by children. When boiled, they are very pleasant. The roots, says Johnson, are edible but are little eaten in England except by children. Convolvulus arvensis Linn. Convolvulaceae. FIELD BINDWEED. Old World tropics, middle Asia and naturalized in America from Europe. This plant gives its flavor to the liquor called noyeau, imported from Martinique, according to Lindley. It reached Philadelphia in 1876 in the packing of exhibits at the Centennial.

Copaifera coleosperma Benth. Leguminosae.
Tropical Africa.
The aril is used in preparing a nourishing drink.

C. hymenaeifolia Moric.
Cuba.
This species is said to be the mosibe of eastern tropical Africa, a tree which yields a red-skinned, fattening, bean-like seed. Corchorus acutangulus Lam. Tiliaceae. Cosmopolitan tropics. This plant is the papau ockroe of the Barbados and is eaten by the negroes as a salad and potherb.

C. antichorus Raeusch.
Old World tropics.
The whole plant is boiled as a potherb.

C. capsularis Linn. JUTE.
Cosmopolitan tropics.
This plant is extensively cultivated in Bengal for its fiber, which forms one of the jutes of commerce so extensively exported from Calcutta. It was introduced into the United States shortly before 1870 and placed under experimental culture, and, in 1873, favorable reports of its success came from many of the southern states. The young shoots are much used as a potherb in Egypt and in India.

C. olitorius Linn. CORCHORUS. JEW'S MALLOW.
Cosmopolitan tropics.
This plant yields some of the jute of commerce but is better known as a plant of the kitchen in tropical countries. It is cultivated in Egypt, India and in France. In Aleppo, it is grown by the Jews, hence the name, Jew's mallow. The leaves are used as a potherb. It is mentioned by Pliny among Egyptian potherbs, and Alpinus, 1592, says that no herb is more commonly used among the Egyptian foods. Forskal also mentions its cultivation in Egypt and notes it among the cultivated esculents of Arabia. In India, it occurs wild and the leaves are gathered and eaten as spinach. In tropical Africa, it is both spontaneous and cultivated as a vegetable and it is in the vegetable gardens of Mauritius. In Jamaica, the plant is frequently met with in gardens but has, in a great measure, ceased to be cultivated, although the leaves are used as a spinach. It is now cultivated in French gardens for its young leaves, which are eaten in salads. It is recorded by Burr as in American gardens in 1863 but the plant seems not to have been mentioned by other writers as growing in this country.

C. procumbens Boj.
Tropical Africa.
This plant was carried to the Mauritius where it is cultivated in kitchen gardens.

C. siliquosus Linn. BROOM-WEED.
Tropical America.
This plant is called te by the inhabitants of Panama who use its leaves as a tea substitute.

C. tridens Linn.
Cosmopolitan tropics.
It is used as a potherb in Egypt.

C. trilocularis Linn.
Old World tropics.
In Arabia this plant is used as a potherb. It is used as a potherb in Sennaar and Cordova, where it is native.

Cordia collococca Linn. Boragineae. CLAMMY CHERRY.
Jamaica.
The fruit is red, with a sweetish pulp and is edible.

C. loureiri Roem. et Schult.
China.
The drupe is red, small, acid and edible.

C. myxa Linn. ASSYRIAN PLUM. SELU.
Tropical Asia and Australia.
The tender, young fruit is eaten as a vegetable and is pickled in India. The ripe fruit is also eaten. The kernel tastes somewhat like a filbert and that of the cultivated tree is better.

C. obliqua Willd.
Tropical India.
The young fruit is pickled and is also eaten as a vegetable.

C. rothii Roem. et Schult.
Western India.
The fruit is eaten.

C. sebestena Linn.
Tropical America.
The plant bears a mucilaginous, edible fruit. Nuttall says it has been observed growing at Key West, Florida.

C. vestita Hook. f. & Thorns.
Himalayan region.
The fruit is filled with a gelatinous pulp, which is eaten and is preferred to that of C. myxa.

Cordyline (Dracaena) indivisa Steud. Liliaceae. DRACAENA. TI.
New Zealand.
The berries are eaten by the New Zealanders.

C. (Dracaena) terminalis Kunth. DRACAENA. TI.
Tropical Asia and Australia.
This plant, common in the islands of the Papuan Archipelago, is there cultivated. In the Samoan Islands, some 20 varieties, mostly edible, are distinguished by name. The thick, fleshy roots contain large quantities of saccharine matter and, when baked, become very agreeable to the taste. The baked ti root, says Ellis, macerated in water, is fermented and then a very intoxicating liquor is obtained from it by distillation. The large, tuberous roots are eaten by the natives of Viti. The tuberous root often weighs from 10 to 14 pounds and, after being baked on hot stoves, much resembles in taste and degree of sweetness stock licorice. The Fijians chew it, or use it to sweeten puddings. The root is roasted and eaten.

Coriandrum sativum Linn. Umbelliferae. CORIANDER.
Southern Europe and the Orient.
The seeds of this plant were used as a spice by the Jews and the Romans. The plant was well known in Britain prior to the Norman conquest and was employed in ancient English medicine and cookery. Coriander was cultivated in American gardens prior to 1670. The seeds are carminative and aromatic and are used for flavoring, in confectionery and also by distillers. The young leaves are put into soups and salads. In the environs of Bombay, the seeds are much used by the Musselmans in their curries. They are largely used by the natives of India as a condiment and with betelnuts and pau leaves. In Burma, the seeds are used as a condiment in curries. The ripe fruits of coriander have served as a spice and a seasoning from very remote times, its seeds having been found in Egyptian tombs of the twenty-first dynasty; a thousand or so years later, Pliny says the best coriander came to Italy from Egypt. Cato, in the third century before Christ, recommends coriander as a seasoning; Columella, in the first century of our era and Palladius, in the third, direct its planting. The plant was well known in Britain prior to the Norman conquest and was carried to Massachusetts before 1670. In China, it can be identified in an agricultural treatise of the fifth century and is classed as cultivated by later writers of the sixteenth and eighteenth centuries. In Cochin China, it is recorded as less grown than in China. In India, it is largely used by the natives as a condiment. Coriander has reached Paraguay and is in especial esteem for condimental purposes in some parts of Peru. Notwithstanding this extended period of cultivation, no indication of varieties under cultivation is found.

Coriaria nepalensis Wall. Coriarieae. TANNER'S TREE.
Himalayan region and China.
Brandis says the fruit is eaten but is said to cause thirst or colic. J. Smith says the fruit is eaten and is not unwholesome.

C. ruscifolia Linn. DEU.
Peru and Chili.
The baccate, fructiferous perianth yields a palatable, purple juice, which is much liked by the natives and from which a kind of wine may be made, but the seeds are poisonous.

C. sannentosa Forst. f. WINEBERRY.
New Zealand.
The fruit affords a refreshing wine to the natives but the seeds are poisonous. It is called tutu.

Cornus amomum Mill. Cornaceae. KINNIKINNIK.
North America.
In Louisiana, this plant is said by Rafinesque to have black fruit very good to eat.

C. canadensis Linn. BUNCHBERRY. DWARF CARNEL.
North America.
This species occurs from Pennsylvania to Labrador on the east and to Sitka on the northwest. The scarlet berries are well known to children, being pleasant but without much taste. They are sometimes made into puddings.

C. capitata Wall.
Himalayan region.
This plant was introduced into English gardens about 1833 as an ornamental. The fruit is sweetish, mingled with a little bitter taste, and is eaten and made into preserves in India.

C. macrophylla Wall. LARGE-LEAVED DOGWOOD.
Himalayan region, China and Japan.
The round, smooth, small berries are eaten in India.

C. mas Linn. CORNELIAN CHERRY. CORNUS. SORBET.
Europe and Asia Minor.
The cornelian cherry was formerly cultivated for its fruits which were used in tarts. There are a number of varieties. De Candolle mentions one with a yellow fruit. Duhamel says there are three varieties in France and Germany; one with wax-colored fruit, another with white fruit and a third with fleshy, round fruit. Don says the fruit is gratefully acid and is called sorbet by the Turks. A. Smith says the harsh, acid fruits are scarcely eatable but are sold in the markets in some parts of Germany to be eaten by children or made into sweetmeats and tarts. J. Smith says the fruit is of a cornelian color, of the size of a small plum, not very palatable, but is eaten in some parts as a substitute for olives; it is also preserved, is used in confectionery and, in Turkey, serves as a flavoring for sherbets. In Norway, the flowers are used for flavoring distilled spirits.

C. sanguinea Linn. CORNEL DOGWOOD. DOGBERRY. DOGWOOD. PEGWOOD.
Europe and northern Asia.
The fruit is said to contain a large quantity of oil used for the table and in brewing.

C. stolonifera (sericea) Michx. RED-OSIER.
North America.
Thoreau found the bark in use by the Indians of Maine for smoking, under the name magnoxigill, Indian tobacco. Nuttall says the fruit, though bitter and unpalatable, is eaten by the Indians of the Missouri River.

C. suecica Linn. KINNIKINNIK.
North America.
The berries are gathered in the autumn by the western Eskimo and preserved by being frozen in wooden boxes out of which they are cut with an axe. In central New York, this plant is called kinnikinnik by the Indians.

Correa alba Andr. Rutaceae
Australia.
Henfrey says the leaves are used by the Australian settlers for a tea.

Corydalis bulbosa DC. Papaveraceae/Fumariaceae. FUMEWORT.
Northern Europe.
This species has a tuberous root, which, when boiled, furnishes the Kalmuck Tartars with a starchy substance much eaten by them.

Corylus americana Walt. Cupuliferae (Corylaceae). HAZELNUT.
North America.
This species bears well-flavored nuts but they are smaller and thicker shelled than the European hazel. The nuts are extensively gathered as a food by the Indians in some places.

C. avellana Linn. COBNUT. FILBERT. HAZELNUT.
Europe and Asia Minor.
This species includes not only the hazelnut but all of the European varieties of filbert. It was cultivated by the Romans, and Pliny says the name is derived from Abellina in Asia, supposed to be the valley of Damascus. Pliny adds that it had been brought into Greece from Pontus, hence it was also called nux pontica. The nut was called by Theophrastus, keraclotic nuts, from Heraclea - now Ponderachi - on the Asiatic shore of the Black Sea. These names probably refer to particular varieties as the species is common in Europe and adjoining Asia. In Peacham's Emblems, we find it stated that the name filbert is derived from Philibert, a king of France, who caused by arte sundry kinds to be brought forth. There are a number of varieties. The best nuts come from Spain and are known as Barcelona nuts. Cobnuts and filberts are largely grown in Kent, England. In Kazan, Russia, the nuts are so plentiful that an oil used as food is expressed from them. Filberts were among the seeds mentioned in the Memorandum of Mar. 16, 1629, to be sent to the Massachusetts Company and are now to be occasionally found in gardens in Virginia and elsewhere.

C. columa Linn. COBNUT.
Eastern Europe, Asia Minor and Himalayan region.
This plant furnishes the imported cobnuts of Britain. The kernels form an important article of food in some parts of the hills of India. The nuts are known in England as cobnuts or Turkish nuts. This tree was carried from Pontus to Macedonia and Thrace and has been distributed throughout Italy. It was brought to Germany in the sixteenth century.

C. ferox Wall.
Himalayan region.
This species bears a small, thick-shelled nut, in taste like the common hazel.

C. rostrata Ait. BEAKED HAZELNUT.
Northeastern America.
The plant bears a well-flavored nut.

C. tubulosa Willd. LAMBERT'S NUT. LOMBARDY-NUT.
Asia Minor and Southern Europe.
This species furnishes the Lombardy, or Lambert's nut. Corynocarpus laevigata Forst. Anacardiaceae (Corynocarpaceae). NEW ZEALAND LAUREL. New Zealand. The pulp of the drupe of this tree is edible, but the embryo is considered poisonous until steeped in salt water. Bennett says it is valued for its fruit and seeds, the former of the size of a plum, pulpy in the interior and sweet. The seeds are used in times of scarcity and contain a tasteless, farinaceous substance. The new seeds are, however, poisonous until steamed for a day and soaked.

Corypha gebanga Blume. Palmae. GEBANG PALM.
Malay.
The pithy substance of the trunk yields a sort of sago.

Costus speciosus Sm. Scitamineae (Costaceae). WILD GINGER.
East Indies and Malay.
Ainslie says the natives of India preserve the root and deem it very wholesome. Lunan says the roots of wild ginger are sometimes used as ginger but are not as good. Browne says this species is found everywhere in the woods of Jamaica.

Cotyledon edulis Brewer. Crassulaceae.
California.
The young leaves are eaten by the Indians.

C. spinosa Linn.
North America.
The leaves are agreeably acid and are eaten.

C. umbilicus Linn. NAVELWORT.
Europe and the adjoining portions of Asia.
This plant is classed by Loudon as a spinach.

Couepia chrysocalyx Benth. Rosaceae (Chrysobalanaceae).
Brazil.
This beautiful tree is said by Mr. Spruce to grow plentifully along the Amazon River from the Barra upward. The Indians plant it near their houses for the sake of its edible fruits.

C. guianensis Aubl.
Guiana.
The seed is edible. The fruit contains a sweet oil like that of the almond.

Couma utilis Muell. Apocynaceae.
Brazil.
This species bears a fruit known as couma which is said by Bates to be delicious. The fruit is a berry containing several seeds embedded in a pulp.

Couroupita guianensis Aubl. Myrtaceae (Lecythidaceae). CANNON-BALL TREE.
Guiana and Cayenne.
The pulp of the fruit is vinous, white, acid and not disagreeable.