i83 



an early date,* nevertheless it does not obtain there any smeblance 

 of the importance assumed in the oceanic islands to the east, where 

 it forms one of the principal articles of diet of thousands of natives. 

 In the East Indies, on the other hand, it is overshadowed by a long 

 series of quicker growing and better tasting sfood products. 



Turning to the Spanish and English voyages from the east it is 

 interesting to note the absence of mention of the breadfruit in the 

 journal of the Chevalier Pigafetta,t who accompanied Magellan 

 during the first circumnavigation of the world. Guam, in the Ma- 

 rianne Islands, was visited during this voyage. They observed in 

 the canoes of the natives various products, such as coconuts, ba- 

 nanas, etc., common to the Pacific, but no breadfruit. Drake, the 

 second circumna^"igator, visited the same group, but did not touch 

 at Guam. He likewise failed to report seeing the fruit, as did also 

 Cavendish, the next to essay circling the globe. From a study of 

 the various accounts of these voyages, however, it may be ascer- 

 tained that in all three cases the visit was made during the months 

 in which the fruit is not in season in that group. 



The records of the early voyages of the Spaniards across the 

 Pacific from New Spain to Asia are largely traditional, although 

 fairly well authenticated by circumstantial evidence. It is not, 

 however, until 1567, with Mendana's discovery of the Solomon 

 Islands, that we can begin to trace with any accuracy the voyages 

 into that mysterious waste of waters. A full account of this first 

 attempt to discover lands in the Pacific would mean a review of 

 Peruvian folk-lore in which the natives had kept alive traditions 

 of inhabited islands to the west,+ and also follow the adventurers 

 on their sail of 3,000 miles to the Solomons. No notice of the 

 breadfruit was made there, but on their way home a low coral 

 island, probably an outlying northern member of the Marshall 

 group, was visited, the Spaniards finding " some of the natives' 

 food, which was very different from those of the islands [Solo- 

 mons], and of a bad taste and smell." That this native food was 

 the breadfruit is extremely likely, judging from negative evidence ; 

 but on the other hand it is just as probable that it was the fruit of 

 the screw-pine (Pandanus) fermented in underground pits. The 

 Pandanus tree is extremely common on the low coral islands of the 

 western Pacific, where it apparently grows without human aid, and 



♦Between 15)5-9 an Italian traveller, Varthema, is snp >osed to have reache J the 

 ^loluccas and U> have told, while on his way back to Europe, the great Indian 

 Viceroy of pDrtugal, D'Albuerqie, of the richea of Ternate and Tidor, In con- 

 >oqueiice of this information Antonio d'Abreu was despatched in 1511 t) reduce 

 these islands to the commercial domination of the Portuguese trader. This expe- 

 dition was not immediately followed up, and the paniards and Dutch found 

 tlioic way to tlie .S(iico Islands in timo to enter rival claims for j) >ssessiou. The 

 Dutch, howevir, by jjeisistenco and good managoment got the upper hand, and by 

 t\x ' fend of the 17th century weie the undisputed masters of these fruitful islands. 



t "The First Voji.ge Around the World by Magellan" (Uakluyt Soc. Ed). 

 liOndMU, 1^74 



X " The Discovery of the Solomon Islands by Alvarj de Meudana in 1508" 

 ( Bakluyt Soc. Ed). Inirod., pp. iv. v. London, 1901. 



