potato, native

n.

a sort of Yam, Gastrodiasesamoides, R. Br., N.O. Orchideae.

1834. Ross, `Van Diemen's Land Annual,' p. 131:

«Produces bulb-tubers growing one out of another, of the size,and nearly the form, of kidney potatoes; the lowermost isattached by a bundle of thick fleshy fibres to the root of thetree from which it derives its nourishment. These roots areroasted and eaten by the aborigines; in taste they resemblebeet-root, and are sometimes called in the colony nativepotatoes.»

1857. F. R. Nixon, `Cruise of the Beacon,' p. 27:

«And the tubers of several plants of this tribe were largelyconsumed by them, particularly those of Gastrodisessamoides [sic], the native potato, so called by thecolonists, though never tasted by them, and having not the mostremote relation to the plant of that name, except in a littleresemblance of the tubers, in shape and appearance, to thekidney potato.»