ROOTS AND TUBERS WE EAT 183 



lishing the potato as a food crop among the Indians 

 that tilled the soil, for it was not known to them 

 before the white men came. 



Sir Walter Raleigh introduced both potato and 

 tobacco into England. He grew potatoes 'in his 

 own garden. Long after it had been grown 

 as a garden vegetable, potato culture widened 

 in importance until, during the eighteenth cen- 

 tury, Scotland was raising potatoes as a field 

 crop, and the French people were awake to its 

 value. 



The name, Irish potato, universally used to dis- 

 tinguish this vegetable from the sweet potato, 

 came from the fact that the potato saved Ireland 

 from the famines that recurred with terrible 

 certainty until the potato was introduced. Now 

 other crops fail, but the potato stands by. 



Occasionally the potato crop is a failure. In 

 1845 a disease called blight attacked the foliage 

 of the plants, preventing the formation of the 

 tubers. This caused a potato famine over all 

 this country and Europe. No such thing can 

 happen again, for spraying the field with Bordeaux 

 mixture, a solution of blue stone and lime, kills 

 the fungus, and saves the foliage. Paris green, 

 added to the spray, kills by poisoning the potato 

 bug, which is the chief insect enemy of the crop. 



