Very little more than this can at present be predicted with regard to what the true "Natural System" really is, which we are still so far from understanding; but it would seem from the peculiar character of Composite, and especially from the double safeguard of their narrowly tubular corollas, their epigynous calyx (pappus), and syngenesious anthers, still further secured by the massing of the flowers into dense heads, that this order, which is also the largest in the vegetable kingdom, should be regarded as the highest and most specialized family of plants, and might be fitly made to crown the natural system. The general arrangement above outlined is further substantiated by the limited data which paleontology affords. The greater part of the fossil plants of this class have been found in the Cretaceous formation. They nearly all belong to the apetalous and polypetalous Divisions, but by far the greater number to the former; such genera as Salix, Quercus, Platanus, Sassafras, etc., occur most frequently, and some of these have been traced to the lowest Cretaceous strata if not to the Jura. That they existed in still earlier times can scarcely be doubted, and high authorities have fixed upon the Trias as the probable epoch in which the earliest dicotyledonous genera made their appearance. In the Upper Cretaceous certain polypetalous genera begin to be found, among which are numbered Magnolia, Liriodendron, Prunus and other multi-staminate plants, most of which have been assigned a high rank in the current system. This fact and others seem rather to indicate that a great many stamens and an elongated receptacle are marks of a low organization, as if just emerging from the catkin-stage. Very few gamopetalous plants are found fossil, strongly implying that they belong to late Tertiary periods. Especially significant is the absence of those having elongated tubular corollas, while it is believed that the first fossil Composite plant is yet to be discovered. Little, therefore, as is really known of the natural succession and actual genealogy of the Dicotyledons, we may, nevertheless, fairly claim to have acquired sufficient data to warrant entering upon the investigation of this difficult and complicated problem, a task which must owe a great share of its success to the aid to be rendered by a rational hypothesis. A STUDY OF THE POPULAR NAMES OF THE MEN THE HADEN. BY PROFESSOR G. BROWN GOODE. HE menhaden, Brevoortia tyrannus (Latrobe) Goode, has at least thirty distinct popular names, most of them limited in application within narrow geographical boundaries. To this circumstance may be attributed the prevailing ignorance regarding its habits and migrations, which has perhaps prevented the more extensive utilization of this fish, particularly in the Southern States. It accounts for the extraordinary blunder of the compilers of the fishery statistics of the census of the United States for 1870, in which the oils produced from the white-fish of the great lakes (Coregonus albus) and the white-fish of Connecticut are classed as identical, a blunder which is followed by a number of others of the same character and quite as certain to mislead. The discrepancy of local names also enables us to understand how the extensive manufacturing interests and fisheries connected with this fish have gradually sprung up, little noticed save by those directly interested in the business. In Maine and Massachusetts the name "pogy" is almost universally in use, though in the vicinity of Cape Ann it is partially replaced by "hard-head" and "hard-head shad." The name. "menhaden" is exclusively applied in Southern Massachusetts, the Vineyard sound, Buzzard's bay and Narragansett bay where it appears to have originated. From the eastern boundary of Connecticut to the mouth of the Connecticut river the name "bony-fish" predominates, while in the western part of the State the species is usually known as the "white-fish." In the waters of New York the usage of two centuries is in favor of mossbunker," a name which also holds throughout New Jersey. In Delaware bay, the Potomac, and Chesapeake bay other variations. are found in alewife" and "greentail." Virginia gives us "bugfish" in its various forms, while in North Carolina we first meet the name of "fat-back," which is more or less prevalent as far south as the St. John's river, Florida. In all the Southern States, especially in the vicinity of Beaufort, N. C., the names "yellowtail" and "yellow-tailed shad" are occasionally heard. I am informed that in the Indian river, Florida, the fish is occasionally called the "shiner " and the "herring." " Among the manufacturers in Port Monmouth, N. J., who prepare the menhaden as an article of food, a number of trade names are in use, such as American sardine" (in distinction from the European fish which is prepared in a similar manner), "American club-fish," shadine," and "ocean trout." These names are not separated in their distribution by sharply defined boundaries. Still, as a glance at the table will show, the habitat, if that term may be legitimately used, of each local appellation appears to be clearly marked. Where there is a discrepancy it can usually be explained. For instance, the general use of the name "menhaden" in the vicinity of Boothbay, Me., is due to the presence of a large number of fishermen and laborers from Rhode Island who carry on the oil-factories in that region. In the same way the name "bony-fish" has been naturalized at Montauk point and Napeague, N. Y. The factories in that neighborhood are owned by firms in Eastern Connecticut, and the Connecticut "bony-fish fleet" has a favorite cruising ground. in the waters of Eastern Long Island. The names “menhaden," "bony-fish" and "moss-bunker" have been introduced into Florida by northern fishermen, who prosecute the winter shad fisheries on the St. John's, and these same names are more or less familiar all along the coast wherever the northern coasters and fishing vessels are known. The adoption of some one suitable name for popular use is eminently desirable. Menhaden" is the name most generally known, as well as the most distinctive. It has the additional recommendation of having been derived from an aboriginal language. It has been used in the titles of the two manufacturers' associations, and it is hoped that this usage will soon be conformed to by all. A few words concerning the origin of the above-mentioned names may not be out of place. "Pogy" and "menhaden" are derived somewhat remotely from the Indian dialects of New England, the latter apparently from that in use in Massachusetts and Rhode Island, the former from a more northern source. For the explanation of the derivation of these names I am indebted to Prof. J. Hammond Trumbull, who writes, "Munnawhatteaûg corrupted to Menhaden, means, literally, fertilizer' (that which manures'). This name was applied to the herring and alewife as well as the menhaden' proper-all these species being used by the Indians for manuring their cornfields. "In the northern and eastern parts of New England the Brevoortia is commonly called Pauhagen, and probably in some localities 'poghaden' (as you write it and which is nearer the Indian original), though I have not heard it so pronounced by eastern fishermen. This name in the eastern dialects has precisely the same meaning as 'menhaden' (or rather munnawhatteaûg in Southern New England). The Abnaki (i. e., coast of Maine) name was Pookagan as Rasles wrote it, and the verb from which it is derived he translated by 'on engraisse la terre.'' According to Mr. J. V. C. Smith, the older fishermen of Northern Massachusetts, New Hampshire and Maine called the fish by the Indian name "pauhagen," and I myself have heard it called "poghaden" by old fishermen about Cape Cod. The modern name may easily have been derived from this by dropping the final syllable. At the present day this name is almost universally in use among the fishermen north of Cape Cod, though it is occasionally varied by “poggie" and "porgy." The use of the latter name should be carefully avoided: the same name, a corruption of the Indian "scuppaug," being commonly applied to another fish, the " Scuppaug" or "scup" (Stenotomus argyrops). As may be supposed, the name of Narragansett origin is most exclusively used in Southern Massachusetts and on the shores of Narragansett bay, the former home of that tribe of Indians. In its present form it first appeared in print in 1792, in the New York Agricultural Transactions, in an article by the Hon. Ezra L'Hommedieu. "Hard-head" and "bony-fish" explain themselves, both referring to the same peculiarity of structure. The former name was first used about 1813 by Belknap in his History of New Hampshire; the latter, as well as "white-fish," by President Dwight in his Travels in New England. The application of "white-fish" is also sufficiently evident, although this name is not a distinctive one, being applied to a large group of North American fresh-water fishes, the Coregonida, and in certain localities to the blue-fish (Pomatomous saltatrix). In England the term "white fish" is used to designate cod, had 1 This probably misled De Kay, who stated that the menhaden were known at the eastern end of Long Island as "skippaugs." He also remarked that "pauhagen" (pronounced Pauhaugen) was the Narragansett epithet, while "menhaden" was that applied by the Manhattan Indians. dock, hake, ling, pollock, soles, turbot, plaice, halibut, and whiting. "Mossbunker" is a relic of the days of the Dutch colony at New Amsterdam, and the name is still lovingly retained by the inhabitants of Manhattan island. It was in use as early as 1661, as we learn from an allusion in Jacob Steendam's poem in "Praise of New Netherland" ('t Louf van Niew Nederland). Allusion has already been made in the letter of Prof. Trumbull, to the great schools of "marsbanckers" seen by Dankers and Sluyter on their visit to New York, in 1679, and every one remembers the reference to this fish in Irving's "Knickerbocker," in connection with the death of the renowned trumpeter, Antony Van Corlear, where the name first appears crystallized in its present form.2 The derivation of this name may be easily traced, it having evidently been transferred by the Dutch colonists from the scad or horse-mackerel, Caranx trachurus (Linn.) Lacepede, a fish which annually visits the shores of Northern Europe in immense 1 This poem, cited by Prof. Trumbull in the Report of the Commission of Fish and Fisheries for 1871-'72, p. 168, was printed, with an English translation, by Hon. Henry C. Murphy, for the Bradford Club of New York (Anthology of New Netherland: Bradford Club Series, No. 4, 1865, pp. 52, 45). The allusion to the Mossbunker is as follows: 2It was a dark and stormy night when the good Antony arrived at the creek (sagely denominated Haerlem river) which separates the island of Mannahatta from the main land. The wind was high, the elements in an uproar, and no Charon could be found to ferry the adventurous sounder of brass across the water. For a short time he vapored like an impatient ghost upon the brink and then, bethinking himself of the urgency of his errand, took a hearty embrace of his stone bottle, swore most valorously that he would swim across in spite of the devil (Spyt den Duyvel), and daringly plunged into the chasm. An old Dutch burgher, famed for his veracity, and who had been a witness of the fact, related to them * that he saw the duyvel, in the shape of a huge moss-bonker, seize the sturdy Antony by the leg and drag him beneath the waves. * Nobody ever attempts to swim across the creek after dark, and as to the moss-bonkers, they are held in such abhorrence that no good Dutchman will admit them to his table who loves good fish and hates the devil." * * * * * * A History of New York *** By Diedrich Knickerbocker. New York, 1809. * |