1D8 HISTORY OF AGRICULTURE. Part I. 



Sect. IV. Present State of Agriculture in South America. 



1201. The climate of South America combines the most opposite extremes. The 

 southern parts are subject to all the horrors of the antarctic frosts ; Terra del Fuego 

 being subject to the almost perpetual winter of Greenland. Even under the torrid 

 aone the cold is extreme on the Andes, and the heat and moisture equally extraordinary 

 in the plains. The surface of the country is remarkably irregular : there are immense 

 chains of mountains which stretch along the western coast from the one extremity of the 

 country to the other. Many parts of the interior are still obscure; wide regions on the 

 great river of Amazons being covered with impenetrable forests, and others flooded by 

 the inundations. In the south there are vast saline plains, and small sandy deserts 

 and savannahs. This country being, or having been, almost entirely under the Spa- 

 niards and Portuguese, the cultivated parts display a slovenly agriculture, something 

 like that of Spain ; the varied and abundant products of the soil depending more on 

 nature than on man. Indeed minerals have always been more the objects of European 

 nations in South America than vegetables. After this general outline we shall, without 

 regard to the recent political changes, offer such slight notices of South American agri- 

 culture as we have been able to collect, under the divisions of Terra Firma, Peru, Chili, 

 Paraguay, Brazil, Cayenne, Surinam, Amazonia, and Patagonia. 



1202. The climate of Terra Firma is extremely hot throughout the year. From the 

 month of May to the end of November, the season called winter by the inhabitants, is 

 almost a continual succession of thunder, rain, and tempests ; the clouds precipitating 

 the rain with such impetuosity, that the low lands exhibit the appearance of an ocean. 

 Great part of the country is of consequence almost continually flooded ; and this, toge- 

 ther with the excessive heat, so impregnates the air with vapors, that in many of the pro- 

 vinces, particularly about Papayan and Portobello, it is extremely unwholesome. The 

 soil of this country is very diiferent, the inland parts being exceedingly rich and fertile, 

 while the coasts are sandy and barren. It is impossible to view, without admiration, 

 the perpetual verdure of the woods, the luxuriancy of the plains, and the towering height 

 of the mountains. This country produces corn, sugar, tobacco, and fruits of all kinds ; 

 the most remarkable is that of the manzanillo tree ; it bears a fruit resembling an apple, 

 but which, under this appearance, contains a most subtile poison. The bean of Car- 

 thagena is the fruit of a species of willow, about the bigness of a bean, and is an excel- 

 lent remedy for the bite of the most venomous serpents, which are very frequent all over 

 this country. 



1203. In Peru the soil is dry, and has no rain, vegetation being supported by immense 

 dews. The only spots capable of cultivation are the banks of the rivers, and other places 

 susceptible of being artificially irrigated. The improvement of the mines is or ought to 

 he the first object of attention in this singular country. 



1204. Chili is an extensive, rich, and fertile country. The climate is the most deli~ 

 cious in the new world, and is hardly equalled by that of any region on the face of the 

 earth. Though bordering on the torrid zone, it never feels extreme heat, being screened 

 on the East by the Andes, and refreshed on the west by cooling sea-breezes. The tem- 

 perature of the air is so mild and equable, that the Spaniards give it the preference to 

 that of the southern provinces in their native country. The fertility of the soil corre- 

 sponds with the benignity of the climate, and it is wonderfully accommodated to Euro- 

 pean productions. The most valuable of these, corn, wine, and oil, abound in Chili, as 

 if they had been native to the country. The soil, even that part of it which has been 

 long in tillage, is so little degenerated by producing successive crops, that no manure is 

 necessary. The grain, as some say, yields from 100 to 1 50 ; but by a more moderate 

 and just estimate, as it is stated both by Molina and in Peyrouse's Vot/agCy from 

 60 to 70 in the midland country, and in the maritime 40 or 50. 



1205. Many of the plants of Chili are the same with those 

 of Europe, and almost all the pot-herbs and fruits of our 

 continent flourish there. The northern provinces produce 

 the sugar-cane, the sweet potatoe, and other tropical plants. 

 Maize is common and abundant ; the magu is a kind of 

 rice, and the tuca a species of barley, both of which were 

 cultivated before the arrival of the Spaniards. Pease and 

 potatoes were also well known to the Chilese. Of the latter 

 they have thirty different kinds : and it is even conjectured 

 that this valuable root was first brought into Europe from 

 this country. The large white strawberry of Chili is well 

 known in English gardens. Many of its plants are valuable 

 as dyes, and others as medicinal. The vira-vira expels the 

 ague ; the payco is excellent for indigestion. Wild tobacco 

 abounds in Chili, and also the annotto {Bixa orellana, fig. 

 204.) The beautiful flowers and shrubs are infinite. In- 

 cense, not inferior to that of Arabia, is produced by a shrub, 

 distilling tears of a whitish yellow, and of a bitter aromatic 

 taste. The trunk of the puvi supplies excellent cork; the 

 salsola kali is plentiful on the shores; and Chili produces seven kinds of beautiful myrtles, one of 

 which yields an excellent stoinachic wine preferred by strangers to any muscatel. The crelon furnishes 



