392 SOUTH AMERICAN TOBACCO. 
however of inferior quality, and is used only for smoking or 
snuff. Perique tobacco, when cut for smoking, is very black 
in appearance, exceedingly smooth, and of peculiar odor. It 
is probably the thinnest tobacco cultivated; and is strong, 
but of agreeable flavor. 
PERUVIAN TOBACCO. 
John Gerard gives the following description of the tobacco 
of Peru: 
“Tobacco, or henbane of Peru, hath very great stalks of 
the bigness of a child’s arme, growing in fertile and well- 
dunged ground of seven or eight feet high, dividing itself in 
sundry branches of great length; whereon are placed in 
most comely order very faire, long leaves, broad, smooth and 
sharp-pointed, soft and of a light green color; so fastened 
about the stalk that they seem to embrace and compass it 
about. The flowers grow at the top of the stalks in shape 
like a bell-flower, somewhat long and cornered ; hollow within, 
of a light carnation color, tending to whiteness towards the 
rims. ‘The seed is contained in long, sharp-pointed cods, or 
seed-vessels, like unto the seed of yellow henbane, but some- 
what smaller, and browner of color. The root is great, thicke 
and of a wooddy substance, with some threddy strings 
annexed thereunto.” 
MEXICAN TOBACCO, 
The tobacco plant seems to have been cultivated in Mexico 
from time immemorial. Francisco Lopez de Gomara, who 
was chaplain to Cortez, when he made conquest of Mexico, 
in 1519, alludes to the plant and the custom of smoking ; and 
Diaz relates that the king Montezuma had his pipe brought 
with much ceremony by the chief ladies of his court, after 
he had dined and washed his mouth with scented water. 
The Spaniards encouraged its cultivation, and to this day it is 
" grown in several of the coast states. Various kinds are cnl- 
tivated, but chiefly a variety bearing yellow flowers, with a 
large leaf of fine flavor resembling the Havana. The plant 
is a favorite with the Mexicans, who prefer it to any other 
product grown. It is cultivated like most varieties of . 
