No. 151.] 415 



Turkish origin, than the name of the English horse hean, proves that 

 that plant originally grew wild in Britain. The general cultivation 

 of maize, in southern Europe, and the production of some new vari- 

 eties, proves nothing with regard to the origin of the species. Nor, 

 where it occurs in the East, there is no proof of its having been car- 

 ried there previously to the discovery of America. 



In favor of the American origin of maize, is the fact that it was 

 found in a state of cultivation in most of the places where the first 

 navigators landed. Columbus discovered it on the Island of Cuba, 

 and other points, where he touched on his first voyage to America, 

 Vasco Nunez, in Guiana; Narvaez and Sottus, in Florida; and Gon- 

 galo Ximines, in New-Grenada; the latter of whom says: " The 

 principal food of the natives was Maiz and Cassave, which first 

 grows on stalks of the size of canes, bearing very large and weighty 

 spikes or ears, each generally yielding seven hundred grains, a bushel 

 of which, when planted in warm moist land, frequently produces 300 

 fold. The maize is distinguished into a coarser and a finer sort, 

 which last is called Moroche, the leaves and stalks affording whole- 

 some provender for horses, and the grains or kernels, bread for the 

 inhabitants, who make it several ways; for sometimes they boil the 

 corn in water, and at other times, parch it in the ashes, or grind it 

 into flour, which when kneaded into dough, they make into cakes, 

 biscuits, etc. Moreover, maize steeped in water, boiled, and after- 

 wards, fermented, makes a very strong liquor." 



All the early historians, both of North and South America, give 

 the strongest testimony that this grain is of American origin, and 

 speak of it as having constituted a great part of the food of the In- 

 dians, from time immemorial. 



Inca Gaicilasso de la Vega, in treating of the products of Peru, 

 says, " Of the fruits that grow above ground, the chief and princi- 

 pal, is that grain which the people of Mexico and Barlovento call 

 Mayz, and those of Peru, Caret, being the only bread they use. And 

 this is of two sorts, one called JlfwrwcAw, which is hard, and the other 

 Capia, which is tender and fine, and which is eaten as bread, either 

 boiled, baked, or parched, over the fire. The hard kind is that which 

 has been brought to Spain, but not the fine and tender sort." The 

 corn of the Incas, he says, was ground by women, between two broad 

 stones in the form of a half moon, from the flour of which, they 

 made a kind of hasty-pudding, called .Jlpi, a great dish among them, 

 esteemed as high feeding, but was not common at every meal. He 



