and on its Introduction into Europe. 157 



Hispaniola, he says : " Theyr meatc is a certeyne roote which 

 they call a(/es, much lyke a navew roote in fourme and greatnesse, 

 but of sweete taste, much lyke a green chesnutte. They use ages 

 more often rosted or sodden, then to make breade thereof/^ — 

 Eden's Translation of the Decades of P. Martyr, book i. p. 3. 



In the personal narrative of the first voyage of Columbus we 

 are informed that the principal subsistence of the natives of His- 

 paniola or Haiti was bread made of the sweet potato, called ajes, 

 niames or names. Columbus saw some of the roots of the thick- 

 ness of a man^s leg. On the homeward voyage of the successful 

 navigator, he carried with him a quantity of these roots as a sub- 

 stitute for bread. This is strong presumptive evidence of the 

 first introduction of the sweet potato into Europe. 



Several varieties of the sweet potato were cultivated by the 

 natives of Hispaniola and Cuba and elsewhere, all of which are 

 mentioned in the ninth book of Martyr^ s third Decade. It is 

 proper to note, however, that the first adventurers nowhere speak 

 of finding this root in a wild state, but always cultivated in the 

 gardens of the Indians. 



That the common potato is indicated among the vegetable 

 productions of the coast of Honduras, we would infer from the 

 tenor of the passage : ^^ There regyons beare also gossampyne 

 trees here and there commonly in the wooddes. Lykewise miro- 

 balanes of sundry kyndes, as those which the physitians caule 

 emblicos and chebulos. Maizium also, jucca, ages and hattatas, 

 lyke unto those whiche we have sayde before to bee founde in 

 other regions in these coastes.^^ — Martyr's third Decade y book iv. 

 p. 105. 



And again, of the productions of Terra Firma : " Theyr com- 

 mon meate is ages, jucca, maxium, battata. * * * There are 

 lykewise dyvers kyndes of the rootes of ages and battata. But 

 they use these rather as fruites and dysshes of service, then to 

 make breade thereof, as we use rapes, radysshes, musheroms, 

 navies, perseneppes, and such lyke. In this case, they mooste 

 especially esteeme the best kynde of battata, which in pleasant 

 taste and tenderness farre excedeth owre musheromes.^^ — Third 

 Decade, b. v. pp. 114, 115. 



From the want of precision in the passages just quoted, we are 

 led to infer that the two very distinct plants, the Solanum tube- 

 rosum and the Convolvulus batatas, are confounded in the verna- 

 cular names ages and battatas. Certain it is that the root termed 

 ages, in the first Decade, is the Colvolvulus, as the comparison of 

 it, as respects form and size, with the nevew, a species of cabbage, 

 the Brassica napus of Linnseus, and its resemblance, in regard 

 to taste, to raw chestnuts, must make manifest. No such de- 

 scription will apply to the common potato. 



