" G." says: "The European Diospyros Lotus, or date-plum, is called Pishamin in Chambers' Cyclopoedia, Art., Date Plum. This word seems to be suspiciously like Persimmon, but the books say the latter is an Indian (American) word".

[European encyclopaedists are not as careful in many cases as one should expect from the pretensions of such works, and we doubt whether " Pisha-min" was ever applied to the Diospyros Lotus. Some author, Parkinson, it runs in our mind, tells that Captain John Smith brought some of our kind, Diospyros Virginiana, to Queen Elizabeth, and told her the Indians called them "Pashimin." Persimmon seems to have been a modern improvement on the original word. At any rate it fixes the origin of the name, whatever should be its orthography, and Chambers must be wrong. - Ed. G. M].

I see by the " Persimmon " item, on page 94 of your capital March number of the Gardeners' Monthly, that you have not at hand the " Works of Captain John Smith," especially the elegant and scholarly edition that Prof. Edward Arber, Birmingham, England, has recently published. The following extracts record what he had to say about persimmons in 1607-9.

In his chapter "Of such things which are naturall in Virginia and how they use them," Captain Smith says : " Plumbs there are of 3 sorts. The red and white are like our hedge plumbs; but the other, which they call Putchamins, grow as high as a Palmeta. The fruit is like a medler; it is first greene, then yellow, and red when it is ripe; if it be not ripe it will drawe a man's mouth awrie with much torment; but when it is ripe, it is as delicious as an Apricock.

"The fruit like medlers, they call Putchamins, they cast uppon hurdles on a mat, and preserve them as pruines." Arber's Works of Captain John Smith, page 57.

This fruit, as you know, is highly esteemed in Virginia, so we are interested in whatever is said of it. You have in the above the origin of the name, I suppose. The present form is one that can be readily evoluted from Putchamin.

Staunton, Va.

[It would be very interesting to know the meaning of the Indian word, Persimmon. - Ed. G. M].