98 READINGS IN BIOLOGICAL SCIENCE 



rice, cottonseed, egg plant, black pepper, taro (dasheen, cocoyam), mango, 

 mangosteen and endive. The islands of the Pacific and Indian Oceans 

 were the source of coconut, bread-fruit, nutmeg and grapefruit. If there 

 were no Ceylon we should have no cinnamon. Northern Europe and Asia 

 comprised the birthplace of the edible varieties of apple, fennel, currant 

 and gooseberry, while the mustard or cabbage family — turnip, rutabaga, 

 cabbage, cauliflower, mustard, kohl-rabi, broccoli, Brussels sprouts — are 

 indigenous to northern Europe. 



From the region of the Caucasus Mountains we have obtained asparagus, 

 quince, pear and plum. Asia Minor and the eastern end of the Mediterra- 

 nean, where men made such early progress, is fairly well determined as the 

 original home of wheat, barley, shallot, fig, date, English walnut, apricot, 

 olive and artichoke. Garlic, although favored in Italy today, took its 

 source from Tartary. 



Southern Europe has contributed parsnip, celery, leek, chestnut, filbert, 

 carrot and lettuce. The last may also have been indigenous to the Orient. 



Africa has contributed no great quantity of food, but their quality 

 is good. Spinach is said to have originated in northern Africa, watermelon, 

 cantaloupe, and akee from tropical Africa and coffee from Abyssinia. 

 The original home of the oat has been placed both in Abyssinia and the 

 Danube River basin. 



The New World has been no mean contributor. From North America 

 come huckleberries, cranberries, pecans, hickory, pumpkin and possibly 

 the kidney bean. Cocoa, corn, avocado, peanut, allspice, guava, vanilla, 

 sapodilla, papaya, star-apple, cassava, chocho and sweet potato stem from 

 tropical America, while pineapple, lima bean, Irish potato, tomato, mate 

 and the herbaceous peppers found their origin in South America. A few 

 foods were already so widely distributed in a cultivated or semi-cultivated 

 form at the commencement of exploration that their original sources must 

 remain unknown. This applies particularly to banana, plantain, ginger 

 and yam. 



Nor is the list complete. Within the last half century we have observed 

 many new importations, particularly in our own country, where chmatic 

 conditions are so varied that both tropical foods and those that thrive in 

 the cold northern climates may find suitable conditions for growth. The 

 labors of the Bureau of Plant Importation, so delightfully described by 

 David Fairchild in his memoirs, "The World Was My Garden," have made 

 available within our own boundaries many of the most delectable of foods, 

 especially those fruits indigenous to the tropics, such as mango, mango- 

 steen, sapodilla, guava and akee. As time goes on these will undoubtedly 

 come into more wide-spread use, as have their less perishable tropical 

 cousins, orange, grapefruit, banana and pineapple. 



The foods that we eat today stem from three general sources: (i) those 

 indigenous to America; (2) those imported by the early colonizers from 



