PLANTS CULTIVATED FOR THEIR FRUITS, 309 



Did it exist, then, in the western part on the shores 

 of the Paeihc ? This seems very unlikely when we 

 reflect that communication was easy between the two 

 coasts towards the isthmus of Panama, and that before 

 the arrival of the Europeans the natives had been active 

 in diffusing throughout America useful plants like the 

 manioc, maize, and the potato. The banana, which they 

 have prized so highly for three centuries, which is so 

 easily multiplied by suckers, and whose appearance must 

 strike the least observant, would not have been forgotten 

 in a few villages in the depths of the forest or upon the 

 littoral. 



I admit that the opinion of Garcilasso, descendant 

 of the Incas, an author who lived from 1580 to 1568, has 

 a certain importance when he says that the natives knew 

 the banana before the conquest. However, the expressions 

 of another writer, extremely worthy of attention, Joseph 

 Acosta, who had been in Peru, and whom Humboldt 

 quotes in support of Garcilasso, incline me to adopt the 

 contrary opinion.^ He says,^ " The reason the Spaniards 

 called it plane (for the natives had no such name) was 

 that, as in the case of their trees, they found some 

 resemblance between them." He goes on to show how 

 different was the plane (Flatanus) of the ancients. He 

 describes the banana very well, and adds that the tree 

 is very common in the Indies (i.e. Ameiica), " although 

 they (the Indians) say that its origin is Ethiopia. . . . There 

 is a small white species of plantain (banana), very delicate, 

 which is called in Espagnolle ^ dominico. There are others 

 coarser and larger, and of a red colour. There are none in 

 Peru, but they are imported thither from the Indies,* as 



* Humboldt quotes the Spanish edition of 1608. The first edition is 

 of 1591. I have only been able to consult the French translation of 

 Eegnault, published in 1598, and which is apparently accurate. 



* Acosta, trans., lib. iv. cap. 21. 



* That is probably Hispaniola or San Dominoro ; for if he had meant 

 the Spanish languas^e, it would have been trauslated by castillan and 

 without the capital letter. 



* This is probably a misprint for Andes, for the word Indes has no 

 sense. The work says (p. 166) that pine-apples do not gi-ow in Peru, but 

 that they are brought thither from the Andes, and (p. 173) that the cacao 

 oomes from the Andes. It seems to have meant hot regions. The wrod 



