HERBALS OF THE NEW WORLD 139 



they are not well able to perform their most laborious employ- 

 ments in the Plantations, or work with any great courage until 

 eleven a clock, their usual time of going to Dinner." A detailed 

 account of the preparation of the drink ends with this vivid 

 picture : " and then taking it off the Fire they pour it out 

 of the Pot into some handsome large Dish or Bason : and after 

 they have sweetened it a little with Sugar, being all together 

 and sitting down round about it like good Fellows, everyone dips 

 in his Calabash or some other Dish, supping it off very hot." 

 He describes all sorts of ways of using the chocolate, the best in 

 his opinion being that of the " Maroonoes Hunters and such as 

 have occasion to travel the Country." They made it into 

 " lozanges," which " exceed a Scotch-man's provision of Oat- 

 meal and Water, as much (in my opinion) as the best Ox-beef 

 for strong stomacks exceeds the meanest food." Chocolate, 

 it will be remembered, became a very fashionable drink in 

 England in the seventeenth century, but Hughes considers 

 it inferior to the genuine stuff made in the Plantations. 

 In fact, he cautions English people to procure their chocolate 

 straight from Jamaica, and then to see themselves to the making 

 of it according to his directions ! 



In spite of its impressive name, The South-Sea Herbal 

 containing the names, use, etc. of divers medicinal plants lately 

 discovered by Pere L. Feuillee, one of the King of France s 

 herbalists . . . much desired and very necessary to be known 

 of all such as now traffick to the South-Seas or reside in those 

 parts (17 1 5), is only eight pages long, five of which are devoted 

 to figures of the plants. Nevertheless this now rare little 

 pamphlet is valuable inasmuch as it is probably the first account 

 in Enghsh of the medicinal plants of Peru and Chili. The writer 

 — James Petiver — began life by serving his apprenticeship 

 to Mr. Feltham, apothecary to St. Bartholomew's Hospital, 

 London. He afterwards quahfied as apothecary and became 

 demonstrator of plants to the Society of Apothecaries. All 



