278 CONTRIBUTIONS FROM THE NATIONAL HERBARIUM. ~*~ 
appear that there are any pine trees in the Veragua district of Panama, 
to which this statement pertains, or that there are any pines with 
edible nuts in the whole Central American region. There are many 
pine fofests in Mexico, Guatemala, and Honduras, but they are not 
known to extend farther south than the latitude of Matagalpa, Nicara- 
cua. The botanical explorations of Professor Pittier in Costa Rica 
and Panama afford conclusive evidence that there are no pines in 
those countries. Professor Pittier also states that ineffectual attempts 
have been made to introduce pines into the central plateau of Costa 
Rica. 
The word translated by Eden as ‘‘date trees’ simply means palms 
(palmarum), and might possibly refer to the fruits of one of the 
Attalea palms or to those of Elaeis melanococea, though neither of 
these could be expected to have received much consideration from 
the standpoint of utility as food, or to have been planted by the 
Indians. The coconut, though hardly distinguished for sourness (0b 
austeritatem), would certainly be a disappointment as a food in com- 
parison with the sweet fruits of the true date. Coconuts are very 
seldom eaten in the Tropics in a raw state except by children; as an 
exclusive diet they were considered very unwholesome, especially by 
the weakened, half-starved men of the Spanish expeditions. 
OVIEDO’S ACCOUNT OF THE COCONUT. 
The source of Eden’s information regarding the American ‘‘dates”’ 
need not be sought further than in the extensive accounts by Oviedo, 
also translated by Eden and published in the same book with Martyr’s 
“Decades.”’* There can be no possible doubt that Oviedo was 
acquainted with the coconut palm. He described it at length in a 
two-page chapter of his quaint Spanish, which Eden rendered into 
contemporary English as follows: 
There is bothe in the firme lande and the Ilandes a certeyne tree cauled Cocus, 
beinge a kynd of date trees and hauynge theyr leaues of the self same greatnesse as 
haue the date trees which beare dates, but dyffer much in their growynge. For the 
leaues of this Cocus grow owte of the trunkes of the tree as doo the fyngers owt of the 
hande; wreathynge them selues one within an other and so spreadynge abrode. These 
trees are hygh: and are founde in great plentie in the coaste of the sea of Sur, in the 
prouince of Cacique Chiman. These date trees brynge furth a frute after this sorte. 
Beinge altogyther vnite as it groweth on the tree, it is of greater circumference then 
the heade of aman. .. . Whyle this Cocus is yet freshe and newly taken from the 
tree, they vse not to eate of the sayde carnofitie and frute: But fyrste beatynge it 
# Oviedo’s original publication was an abridgment entitled, Oviedo dela natural hys- 
toria de las Indias. (Toledo, 1526.) This was translated by Richard Eden under 
the title, The natural history of the West Indies, and published in Arber, E., the 
first three English books on America. (Birmingham, 1885.) The complete work was 
first issued at Madrid in 1851. (See footnote, p. 295.) Books 1-19 and 10 chapters of 
book 50 were published in Seville, 1535, as La historia general delas Indias. 
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