From the New York Statesman.
Extract of a letter, dated Canandaigua, July, 1820.
I saw for the first time in the Seneca river at Montezuma, the
aquatic plant called wild rice, or folle arvine. It grows all over
the west and north; and wherever it flourishes, myriads of waterfowl
are attracted to it, and derive their chief support and exquisite
flavour from its alimentary qualities. In the lakes and rivers
adjoining Montezuma, thousands of wild geese and ducks of all kinds
congregate at the proper season for food, except the canvas back
duck, or anas valsineria of Wilson, which derives its name from a
water plant called valsineria, on the roots of which it feeds, and
which Wilson states to be a fresh water vegetable, that grows in
some parts of the Hudson and Delaware, and in most of the rivers
that fall into the Chesapeake.
Some difficulty has occurred not only about the botanical name, but
also about the botanical character of the wild rice, or wild oats.
The confusion of nomenclature has arisen from Linnæus himself. In
his Species Plantarum, he has denominated it zezania aquatica, and
in his mantisa, zezania palustris--and it has been called by other
botanists, zezania claurlosa. I shall prefer the first name as
most characteristic. It has been well described by Mr. Lambert, as
zezania panicula inferne racemosa superne spicata. Pursh represents
it as a perennial plant. Nuttall and Michaux are silent on this
point, and Eaton says it is an annual, in which opinion I concur.
Mr. Lambert, in a communication in the 7th volume of the
Transactions of the Linnæan Society of London, has given a figure
of this plant as growing at Spring Grove, the seat of sir Joseph
Banks, in England. It appears that sir Joseph received some of the
seed gathered in a lake, in Canada, and put it in jars of water. It
was sown in a pond at Spring Grove, where he has a great quantity of
the plant, growing annually, ripening its seeds extremely well in
autumn, and sowing itself round the edges.
By what I can learn, this same plant grows in Lake George, and Lake
Champlain, and in all the western lakes. It produces seed in some
places in September, and in others in October. It grows in shallow
water, and, sometimes to the height of eight feet. Some of the
western Indians derive their principal support from it. The grain
it bears is superior to the common rice, and if cut before ripe, it
makes excellent fodder, embracing the advantages of hay and oats.
Mr. Lambert's figure of the plant in the Linnæan Transactions is
accurate, and exactly resembles the one growing in the Seneca River.
Its productiveness may be inferred from the food it furnishes to
thousands of human beings, and to myriads of aquatic animals. From
the success of the experiments of Sir Joseph Banks, it is highly
probable that it will grow in any part of this country and Great
Britain; and if so, may it not be considered as a good substitute
for the oryza sativa, or common rice. It is well known that the
latter furnishes more subsistence to the human race than any
other plant. Pursh mentions a grass which he calls the oryzopsis
asperifolia, which he observed on the broad mountains of this
country, and which he says contains large seeds, that produce the
finest flour. Perhaps this species of oryzopsis, although generally
different, bears the same relation to z aquatica in its importance
and place of growth, as the mountain rice of India does to the
common rice of that region. At all events, the more I see of this
country, the more I am convinced of its vast ability to support the
human species and of the propriety of calling its latent powers into
operation.