78 THE BOOK OF ENSILAGE. 



When Carrier visited Hochelaga, now Montreal, in 1535, 

 that town was situated in the midst of extensive corn- 

 fields. In 1586 Heriot refers to maize cultivated in 

 Virginia, and called by the natives " pagatour ; " and John 

 Smith in 1606 describes the Indian method of culture 

 then. Champlain in 1605 found it growing in fields all 

 along the New-England coast, and describes the man- 

 ner of its culture. Our Puritan fathers found it in 

 store upon their first expedition of discovery, and speak 

 of the deserted corn-fields, for the time was winter. The 

 Five Nations, in 1603, m ^de corn-planting their business 

 before the French arrived in Canada. The Iroquois 

 raised it in such large quantities that in the invasion 

 into the country of the Senecas, in 1687, some 1,200,000 

 bushels were destroyed. The Indians of Illinois culti- 

 vated corn when the country was first described by Mar- 

 quette in 1673, by Allouez in 1676, and Membre in 

 1679. In Louisiana they had even invented a hoe for 

 its culture. 



This list might be indefinitely extended ; for so uni- 

 versal was the use of maize by the aborigines, that its 

 mention is to be found in nearly all the early chroniclers, 

 and it seems never to have been grown as a luxury 

 simply, but rather as a source of supply, and as a staple 

 food. In the southern country, it was so largely grown 

 that many tribes may be considered as agriculturists, 

 rather than as hunters ; in the northern countries it 

 shared with the products of the chase the claims of a 

 sustenance. Its merits, too, were quickly recognized 

 by Europeans, and it soon found introduction to Europe, 

 and a wide distribution. It had a strong agency in the 

 settlement of this country, as it afforded relief from star- 

 vation to the " Conquisitors " in the South, and to plain 

 Miles Standish and his contemporaries in the North. 



