Chap. III. O F M A I. Z. 281 



: Bread made of the flour of maize alone, is y,elk)wj and it is 

 heavy, and hard to be digefted, becaufe the dough ferments very 

 Httle, if at all. However, many of the peafants in Cayenne fed 

 upon it for whole years without finding any inconvenience from it; 

 particularly in 1738* when all the corn of that province was dc- 

 flroyed by hail ; and in 1748, during the great fcarcity of cqrn. 

 They likewife made a kind of hally-pudding with the flour of maiz, 

 which is well tailed enough, but fits heavy upon,, the flonrach. 



Maiz is alfo of great uie to fatten poultry and hogs. It is" given 

 whole to the larger kind of fowls, and broken a little to others. 



When maiz is planted for fodder, particularly of cows and 

 oxen, it is in a good foil, Vv'hich is plowed twice, and well dung- 

 ed ; after which the grain is fowed and harro\yed in, or covered 

 with a rake. 



Maiz is a great impoverifher of land : for though the ground be 

 dunged every time it is planted with this grain, it has been obfcrved 

 that wheat never does fo well in the furrows where maiz has grown, 

 as in the neighbouring fields where it never was. 



M. Aimen has obferved, i. That it is important to fow maiz, 

 rather in the beginning, than at the end of May j becaufe, if it is 

 fowed early, the plants will have acquired fufficient ftrength before 

 the great heats, to flioot out then with vigour: and their ears will 

 not be parched, or liable to that barrennefs to which maiz fowed too 

 late is fub)e6l : and not only their ftalks will be flronger, but their 

 ears will be bigger and fuller of grain : 2. That the ears of the maiz 

 are greatly hurt by cutting the panicles too late ; and that they ought 

 to be cut before the hoods open. By leaving a plant with its male 

 ears at every twenty feet diflance, ail the female plants will be im- 

 pregnated. 



For two years together, M. Aimen fingled out two rows of maiz, 

 the plants of which feemed to him equally ftrong. He cut off the 

 panicles of the male flowers of all the plants in the firfl: row, before 

 their hoods opened : the panicles of the other row were not cut off 

 till the ulual time of performing that operation ; the confequence 

 was, that the female ears of the firfl row were much the largefl 

 and befl filled with grain. 



M. Aimen fowed a row of maiz at a diflance from any othc^r 

 field planted with that corn. He cut ofl' the panicles of that row, 

 before the hoods were opened, leaving only one plant with its male 

 flowers at every twenty feet diflance. At harvell, he obferved, 



Oo I. That 



