328 



PLANTS Wixn NUTRITIVE ROOTS. 



Source of 

 Uie potato. 



Products of 

 the higher 

 regiona. 



CHAP.xxv. this opinion is erroneous, and that the plant in question 

 is nowhere to he found uncultivated in any part of the 

 Cordilleras witliin the tropics. According to Molina it 

 is a native of all the fields of Chili, where another species, 

 the Solarinni cari, still unknown in Europe, and even in 

 Quito and Mexico, is grown ; and M. Humboldt seems 

 to consider that country as tlie original source of it. It 

 is stated that Sir Walter Raleigh found it in Virginia in 

 1584 ; and a question arises, whetiier it arrived there 

 from the north, or from Chili, or some other of the 

 Spanish colonies. Our traveller seems to consider it 

 not improbable that it had been (conveyed from some of 

 the Spanish colonies by the English themselves. 



The phmts cultivated in the highest and coldest parts 

 of the Andes and IMexican cordilleras are potatoes, the 

 Tropa'olum esculentum, and the Chenopodium quinoa. 

 The first of these are an important object in the latter 

 country, as they do not require much humidity. The 

 Mexicans and Peruvians preserve them for a series of 

 years, by destroying their power of germinating by ex- 

 posure to frost, and afterwards drying them, — a practice 

 which our author thinks might be followed with advan- 

 tage in Europe. He also recommends obtaining the 

 seeds of the potatoes cultivated at Quito and Santa Fe, 

 which are a foot in diameter, and superior in quality to 

 those in the Old Continent. It is unnecessary to expa- 

 tiate on the advantages derived from this invaluable root, 

 the use of which now extends from the extremity of 

 Africa to Lapland, and from the southern regions of 

 America to Labrador. 



The New World is very rich in plants witli nutritive 

 roots. Next to the manioc and tlie potato, the most 

 important arc the oai, the batate, and the igname. The 

 first of these (Oxalis tuherosa) grows in the cold and 

 temperate parts of the cordilleras. The igname (Diosco- 

 rva alata) appears proper to all the equinoctial regions 

 of tiie ghjbe. Of tlie batate (^Convolvulus batatas), several 

 varieties arc raised. Tlie cacomite, a species of Tigridia, 

 tlie root of which yields a nutritive farina ; numerou.« 



Nutritive 

 foots. 



