516 ANNUAL EEPORT SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, 1925 



ton and (he cherr}- tree. In the appendix to the report of the com- 

 mittee of the board of a<iriculture concerning the culture and use 

 of potatoes is the following communication dated March 14, 1795 : 

 " In 1584 Sir Walter Raleigh, so celebrated for his worth, his valor, 

 and his misfortunes, discovered that part of America called Norem- 

 bega and by him named Virginia. Whether the admiral was ac- 

 quainted with the potato on his first voyage or whether it was sent to 

 him by Sir Thomas Grenville or Mv. Lane, the first governor of Vir- 

 ginia, is uncertain. It is probable that he was possessed of the root 

 about the year 1586. He is said to have given it to his gardener, in 

 Ireland, as a fine fruit from America, and which he desired him to 

 plant in his kitchen garden in the spring." Then follows an alleged 

 conversation between Sir Walter and his gardener, Mdiich w^as later 

 attributed to Sir Francis Drake and his gardener, to be quoted 

 below. 



This transfer of the honor of introducing the potato from Raleigh 

 to Drake was the result of investigators, who found that Sir Walter 

 had not discovered Norembega, had never indeed been in Virginia, 

 and that his unfortunate colony on Roanoke Island had been brought 

 home by Sir Francis Drake. They did not, however, establish the 

 fact that Sir Francis ever had a garden in Ireland or a gardener 

 in any countrj^ There is not a particle of evidence that Sir Walter 

 ever saw a potato in America, and the only opportunity which Sir 

 Francis Drake had to see one was in November, 1578, when after 

 passing through the Straits of Magellan he turned northward and 

 received some potatoes from the natives of Mocha, an island in 

 38° 30' south latitude on the coast of Chile. From this place he 

 continued northward, looting the coast towns of Chile and Peru, 

 and then " sailing along the backside of America to 43° of northerly 

 latitude," after wdiich he returned to England across the Pacific and 

 Indian Oceans, rounding the Cape of Good Hope, " the fairest cape 

 we saw in the whole circumference of the earth." 



Completing his " renowned voyage, the second circumnavigation 

 of the earth," in November, 1580, he was honored by a visit from his 

 sovereign. Queen Elizabeth, who dined with him on board his ship, 

 the Pelican, but there is no record that potatoes appeared on the bill 

 of fare. Indeed, it was not until eight years afterwards that he is 

 alleged to have introduced the potato. 



Following are the two legends, the second of which I have trans- 

 lated from the work of a German clergyman. Rev. Dr. Carl Wil- 

 helm Ernst Putsche, published in 1819 : 



THE RALEIGH LEGEND 



Solunuvi tuhcrosuin, the common potato oU our fields and gardens, was first 

 introduced by Sir Walter Raleigli, wlio brought the roots from Quito and 

 caused them to be planted in his own garden in Youghal, in Ireland. On the 



