266 DOMESTICATED ANIMALS AND PLANTS 



indistinct and difficult to establish, and to prepare the student 

 for seeing both of these species described under various names. 

 The cowpea has been recently introduced into our southern 

 states from China, where it has been cultivated as human food 

 from great antiquity. Like the soy bean this crop is fed freely 

 to live stock in our country and consequently neither is used as 

 human food. 1 



1 Man has a strange aversion to consuming the same grain he feeds his 

 stock, and he positively refuses to eat it if it be^a recent importation. The 

 first question asked of a new food plant is this : " Is it for man or animal ? " 

 without thinking it may be good for both ; but the question once answered, the 

 future of the thing is settled. This is why all efforts to introduce Indian corn 

 into Europe to replace rye as human food have failed in the past and are likely 

 to continue to fail in the future. Even the pauper resists what he considers to 

 be putting him on a level with the animals. 



