32 
first fruits of the maize harvest were offered to the goddess 
Cinteutl, equivalent to the Ceres of the Romans. In Peru the 
virgins of the sun offered sacrifices of maize bread. Next to rice, 
it is said to furnish food for a greater part of mankind than any 
other cereal. The output in the United States in 1910 was 
2,886,260,000 bushels, cultivated on 104,035,000 acres, the 
United States ieee about 71% of the world crop of this 
cereal for that yea e above acreage would equal about 
162,554 square aie. an area equivalent to the whole of ies 
pra New York, New Jersey and Delaware. The 
this country was valued at over one and a third tiltions 
a ie is the largest producer of corn, with a yield 
in I910 of 10,250,000 bushels. Remember that a large part of 
the corn crop is used as focd for beasts, and another large part 
in the production of whis 
We now come to rice, the most cua of all cereals, as it 
furnishes food for the greatest number of people. It is of great 
antiquity, its cultivation being fully established i in the Euphrates 
valley in the time of cae 400 B.C. It forms almost the 
exclusive diet in India, China, and Malaysia. In addition to 
these countries, it is also ee largely in Japan, the Philip- 
pines, Brazil, the southern United States, and to some extent 
in Italy and Spain. It was introduced into cultivation in the 
United States in 1694, and is now cultivated in the South Atlantic 
and Gulf States. In 1910 the yield in this country was about 
11,347,000 bushels, which was about one two-hundredth of the 
world’s crop for that year. This cereal, unlike the others con- 
sidered here, needs wet or flooded land for its development. 
This makes its cultivation quite different. 
The rice as it comes from the thresher Sieen of the grain 
proper with its close-fitting cuticle in the stiff hard husk. In this 
condition it is known as “paddy” or aka rice. It is then 
milled, the pe being to remove the husk and cuticle and 
polish the n. It is the polishing process which gives to the 
eens 7 Eaten its pearly luster, but at the expense of some 
f its most essential food elements. This polishing removes 
nearly all the fats which reside in the outer parts of the rice 
