298 NATIVE COUNTRY OF THE POTATO. 



not mention them in bis list of the indigenous plants of the 

 country ; and I am led to believe, from his manner of ex- 

 pressing himself, that they were not cultivated by the In- 

 !«?; name in dians. It is to be. observed, however, that this intelligent 

 Indian tribes traveller mentions the Indian names, among two of the 

 him"^ tribes, or nations, of the potato. This, however, from what 



1 have already said, is no manner of proof, that the solanura 

 tuberosum was really an indigenous plant, in North Caro- 

 lina, where Lawson made his principal observations and in- 

 n^e Indians quiries. Every one, acquainted with the Indians, has been 



t^-xy apt at gtnjck with the quickness of their mental perceptions, and 

 giving names, ... , ^ • i i • , , i 



with the rapid ease with which they bestow names, often 



very significant, upon new objects, especially natural ob-p 

 jects, which they have never seen before*. 

 Colonel Haw- My friend. Colonel Benjamin Hawkins, who resides as 

 kins S4JS, public agent from the government of the United States 

 among the Creek Indians; and who is, perhaps, as well ac- 

 quainted with the history, manners, state of improvement, 

 &c., of these and other southern tribes of savages, as any man 

 that all th« io America; assures me, that all the Indians, with whom he 

 Imiians ascribe js acquainted, agree in considering the solanum tuberosum 

 lion of the ' as a foreign or strange plant in their countries ; and that it 

 potato to the is only within a very few years, that these people have begun 

 •w 11 es. ^^ p^y ^^y attention to the cultivation of this plant, which 



they explicitly say they received from the European Ame«f 

 ricans, or whites, 

 Bartratn's tes- M*"* William Eartram (MS. penes met speaking of the 

 tijnonj. southern Indians of Carolina and Georgia) says, *' Their 



vegetable food consists chiefly of corn (zea), rice, convol- 

 vulus batatas, or those nourishing roots usually called sweet 

 or Spanish potatoes; (but in the Creek confederacy, they ne- 

 ver plant or eat the solanum tuberosum, or Irish potato, 

 vulgo.") 

 Other similar 1 might, without difficulty, go on to adduce many 

 arguraems other proofs, or arguments, similar to those already mention- 



* The Tuscaroras and the Woccous, the two Indian tribes mentioned 

 by Lawson, call potatoes, untone and viauk. Thw« tribes had much 

 coramunicalion vf'nh the English^ at an early p»riod. 



ed. 



