CHARACTERS. 
» His maintenance was thus se- 
eured, and his situation soon be~ 
came sufficiently comfortable. — 
The administration of the house 
seeing that his conduct justified 
his success, induced the King in 
1772 to make him Apothecary in 
Chief; a recompense which an 
unforeseen accident rendered more 
complete than had been intended, 
or than he had expected. 
‘The pharmacy of the Invalids 
had been directed from its first es- 
tablishment by the Seurs de Cha- 
rité. These good women, who 
had made a great deal of young 
Parmentier while he was only their 
boy, took it ill that he should be 
put upon a level with them. They 
made so much noise, and put in 
motion such powerful interest, 
that the King himself was obliged 
to draw back ; and after two years 
of controversy, he made the sin- 
gular decision that Parmentier 
should continue to enjoy the ad- 
vantages of his place, but should 
no longer fulfil its functions. 
This enabled him to devote the 
whole of his time to his zeal for 
researches of general utility. From 
that moment he never interrupted 
them. 
The first opportunity of pub- 
lishing some results respecting his 
favourite subject had been given 
him in 1771, by the Academy of 
Besangon. The scarcity in 1769 
had drawn the attention of the ad- 
ministration and of philosophers 
towards vegetables which might 
supply the place of corn, and the 
Academy had made the history of 
them the subject of a prize, which 
Parmentier gained. He. endea- 
voured to prove in his dissertation 
that the most useful nourishing 
substance in vegetables is starch, 
439 
and he showed how it might be 
extracted from the roots and seeds 
of different indigenous plants, and. 
how deprived of the acrid and poi- 
sonous principles which alter it in 
some plants. He pointed out, 
likewise, the mixtures which would 
assist in converting this starch 
into good bread, or at least into a 
kind of biscuit fit for being eaten 
in soup. 
There is no doubt that in cer- 
tain cases some advantage may be 
derived from the methods which 
he proposes; but as most of the 
plants pointed out are wild, scan- 
ty, and would cost more than the 
dearest corn, absolute famine is 
the only thing that could induce 
mankind to make use of them.— 
Parmentier easily perceived that it 
was better to turn the attention 
of cultivators to such plants as 
would render a famine, or even a 
scarcity, impossible. He therefore 
recommended the potatoe with all 
his might, and opposed with con- 
stancy the prejudices which oppos- 
ed themselves to the propagation 
of this important root. 
Most botanists, and Parmen- 
tier himself, have stated on the 
authority of Gasper Bauhin that 
the potatoe was brought from 
Virginia about the end of the six- 
teenth century; and they usually 
ascribe to the celebrated and un- 
fortunate Raleigh the honour of 
having first brought it to Europe. 
I think it more probable that it 
was brought from Peru by the 
Spaniards, Raleigh only went to 
Virginia in the year 1586; and 
we may conclude, from the testi- 
mony of Cluvius, that in 1587 the 
potatoe’ was common in different 
parts of Italy, and that it was al- 
ready given to cattle in that coun- 
try. 
