1896. Purposes of Ethno-Botany. 149 
is of importance as deciding upon the original home and past 
distribution. 
3. An ethno-botanical study helps us to decide as to the 
ancient trade routes. I have shown that maize was intro- 
duced into the West Indies by the tribes which had emigrated 
from the South American continent; that South America de- 
tived the cereal from the tribes living adjacent to the Rio 
Grande and tributaries, 
Considerable difficulty, however, is experienced in the study 
ofa single isolated plant, for the trade routes may have been 
various, but when we introduce as evidence two or at least: 
half a dozen plants, we can determine with greater accuracy 
the main trade routes. 
There cannot be any doubt that such trade routes existed. 
Passed his father’s house in central Pennsylvania on their way 
to the salt licks of Virginia. I remember seeing the trail 
that led southward through his woodland, as used by Chief 
Hogan and his band of hunters. 
what is now the state of Minnesota. Mr. Joly says with re- 
~ ed European archaeology: ‘‘How far the commercial 
speed the primitive people of Europe extended and what 
far they followed is a question the solution of which, like 
ever th ® many others, is as yet merely guessed at. How- 
Medit © Presence of amber from the Baltic, and of white 
Catyed pa coral in Switzerland, Italy and elsewhere, of 
does —_ in abundance in the Isle of Elba where this rock 
obsidis ot exist in the natural state, arrows made of the black 
era es Sardinia, found in the same island and in that of 
Sa, th 
man those of augite of Auvergne found in Brittany; the 
oi Tom the 
Ist : ” 
Sam es 2mong the most ancient inhabitants of Europe.” The 
© princi 
- arts of the globe. Commerce very early carried 
°od from the Rhine country to the Baltic, where the tree 
12—Vo}, XXI.—No. 3, 
— 
