C 34 ] 



account (see " A notable Discourse, etc." in Hakluyt's Voyages, 

 London. 1598, Vol. III., p 462) it is noted that, " about Mexico 

 and other places in Nova Hispania there groiveth a certain plant 

 called Magueis which yieldeth wine, vineger, hong, and blacke 

 sugar, and of the leaves of it dried they make hewpe, ropes, shooes 

 which they me, cmd tiles* for their houses, and at the end of every 

 leaf there groiveth a sharp point like an awle, wherewith they use 

 to bore or pearce thorow anything" Hawhes, a merchant who 

 resided in New Spain about the same period (I.e. p. 463) also 

 mentions the " Magueiz" as the source of a wine which is 

 called " Pulco" In 1601 Hahluyt published a translation of 

 the " Descobriomentes " (published 1563) by Antonie Galliano 

 who was Governor of the Portuguese East Indies in the earlier 

 half of the 16th century. This contains a full account (among 

 other wonders of New Spain, such as the Humming Birds) 

 of the Metl or Honey Tree, which is unmistakeably the 

 Maguey or Metlf of Humboldt. 



F. Lopez de Go mam (author of the Life of Cortes) gives 

 a similar but more exact account of the Metl, adding that the 

 Spaniards call it Car don. 



In his General History of the Spanish Indies published 

 about the same period Acosta (v. Danielli, I.e., p. 68, quoting 

 Martins} describes " El Arbor de las Maravillas es el Maguey " 

 as a Peruvian species differing from that of New Spain (i.e. 

 Mexico). 



From these different histories it is clear that one kind of 

 Maguey was known in San Domingo and other West Indian 

 Islands from the time of their discovery by Europeans, and 

 that different plants, probably Agaves or Furcrseas, which were 

 employed for various economic uses on the mainland were 

 identified with the Island kinds by the Spanish J conquerors, of 

 which the best known was the wine producing Metl of the 

 Mexicans. As has been noted, however, there were several kinds 

 of Metl. 



* This use is noted in the Canaries, where Agave is natur alized, by 

 Leopold von Buch (French translation of Chap. IP. of the main work 

 reprinted from Archives de Sotanique after}181T). 



f The early writers, whose etymology was comprehensive, clearly connected 

 this Aztec appellation with the " honey" which distils in the perianth of differ- 

 ent species of Agaveae. 



J This was written before we had seen Martius* " Beitrag, etc." in which 

 he arrives at a similar conclusion. 



