2 THE POTATO. 



hood of _Quito, where they were called jmpas, to Spain, 

 early in the sixteenth century. From Spain, where they 

 were called Jtattatas, they found their way to Italy, and 

 there received the same name as the truffle, taratoufti. 

 From Italy they went to_Vienna, through the Governor of 

 Mons in Haiiihault, who sent some to Clusius in 1598. 

 To England the potato found its way from North America, 

 being brought from Virginia by the colonists sent out by 

 Sir Walter Ilaleigh in 1584, and who returned in July, 

 1586, and 'probably,' says Sir Joseph Banks, 'brought 

 with them the potato.' Gerarde, in his Herbal, published 

 in 1597, gives a figure of the potato under the name of 

 Potato of Virginia, whence, he says, he received the roots; 

 and this appellation it appears to have retained, in order 

 to distinguish it from the battatas or sweet potato (Con- 

 volvulus battatas) till the year 1640, if not longer. . . . 

 Gough says the potato was jfirst planted by Sir Walter 

 Raleigh on his estate of Youghal, lu-nr Cork, and that they 

 were soon after carried into Lancashire. Gerarda and 

 Parkinson, however, mention them as delicacies for the 

 confectioner, and not as common food. Even so late as 

 Bradley *s time (1716, in his * Historia Plantarum Succu- 

 lentarum ') they are spoken of as inferior to skirrets and 

 radishes. 



" The use of potatoes, however, became more and more 

 known after the middle_pf the eighteenth century, and has 

 greatly increaseTTrT all parts of Britain within the last 

 thirty years. It is also very general in Holland and many 

 parts of France and Germany, and is increasing rapidly 

 in Russia. In Spain and the East and West Indies they 

 are not much cultivated, owing to the heat of the climate ; 

 but in all the temperate parts of North America, Australa- 

 sia, and South America, they are grown by the colonists. 

 In China they are cultivated, but not extensively, owing 

 to the slow progress which everything new makes in that 

 country. Indeed, no root hitherto discovered is so well 

 adapted for universal use as the tubers of the potato; for, 

 having no peculiarity of taste, and consisting chiefly of 



