492 MR. J. G. BAKER ON THE 
spontanément à Valparaiso, d’où M. Blanchard, consul de France, 
en ce lieu a rapporté des tubercules à M. Vilmorin, son parent, 
qui les cultive depuis l'année 1854. Les tubercules, peu nom- 
breux, sont trés petites et d'une saveur acre; ceux que j'ai vu 
en Novembre étaient de forme ellipsoide et longs d'un pouce et 
demi à 23.” 
From all that we know it would appear therefore that in Chili 
S. tuberosum is a plant of the hills of the interior, S. Maglia ot 
the near neighbourhood of the coast. This is still further con- 
firmed by the faet that the wild potato found by Darwin in the 
Chonos Archipelago, in south latitude 44°-45°, is undoubtedly 
conspecific with the S. Maglia of Valparaiso. Original specimens 
from Darwin are in the Kew herbarium, and they are quite 
characteristic of S. Maglia, differing only from the plant grown in 
Kew Gardens just described by their larger (white) corolla and 
more densely hispid calyx, with moreacuteteeth. Darwin’s note 
on the plant, as printed at page 288 of the 1835 octavo edition 
of the ‘ Voyage of the Beagle, is as follows :—“ Chonos Archi- 
pelago.—The wild potato grows on the islands in great abun- 
dance on the sandy shelly soil near the sea-beach. The tallest 
plant was 4 feet in height. The tubers were generally small; 
but I found one of an oval shape 2 inches in diameter. They 
resembled in every respect and had the same smell as English 
potatoes; but when boiled they shrunk mueh and were watery 
and insipid, without any bitter taste. They are undoubtedly 
here indigenous. They grow as far south, according to Mr. Low, 
as latitude 50°, and are called Aquinas by the wild Indians of 
that part. The Chilotan Indians have a different name for them. 
Professor Henslow, who has examined the wild specimens which 
I brought home, says they are the same with those described by 
Mr. Sabine from Valparaiso; but they form a variety which by 
some botanists has been considered as specifically distinct. It 
is remarkable that the same plant should be found on the sterile 
mountains of Central Chili, where a drop of rain does not fall for 
more than six months, and within the damp forests of these 
southern islands." The true explanation of what Darwin in the 
last sentence, with characteristic sagacity, commented upon as 
very remarkable, is evidently that the Chonos plant and that of 
the Chilian Cordilleras are each distinct species. 
The plant dealt with by Sabine in his well-known paper “ On 
the Native Coyntry of the Wild Potato,” in the 5th volume 
