10 INDIAN CORN CULTURE. 
war in 1637 the English destroyed over two 
hundred acres of corn planted by the Indians. 
The Puritans in King Philip’s war, in 1675, took 
“what he had worth, spoiled the rest, and also 
took possession of one thousand acres of corn, 
which was harvested by the English.”* Wher- 
ever the early explorers or voyagers went they 
found either fields of Indian corn or the Indians 
using the grain for food. Capt. John Smith, in 
his “Indians of Virginia,” tells of the methods 
of planting at that time (1608). Cabeca de Vaca 
found an abundance of maize near Tampa Bay, 
Florida, in 1528.+ In 1679 La Salle, when on a 
trip through the Great Lakes and across Illinois, 
found large quantities of stored corn in a vil- 
lage of [hnois Indians and took about forty 
bushels of it.t Columbus in 1495 writes to 
Ferdinand and Isabella of the maize plant and 
of fields eighteen miles long. The early ex- 
plorers also noted maize as an important article 
of food for man in Yucatan, Nicaragua, and 
Mexico. 
Harshberger’s conclusions.—In his impor- 
tant historical study of maize, Harshberger 
says:§ 
“The evidence of archzology, history, ethnology, and 
philology, which points to central and southern Mexico as 
* Harshberger; Maize: A botanical study, etc., p. 131. 
+ Torrey Botanical Club Bulletin, VI, p. 86. 
1 Harshberger; Maize: A botanical study, etc., p. 135. 
¢ Ibid., p. 151. 
7 
