Chap. IX. ON CULTIVATED PLANTS. 309 



of a wild grass , and farther south, as Andersson informs me, 

 the natives largely use the seeds of a grass of about the size of 

 canary-seed, which they boil in water. They eat also the roots 

 of certain reeds, and every one has read of the Bushmen 

 prowling about and digging up with a fire-hardened stake 

 various roots. Similar facts with respect to the collection of 

 seeds of wild grasses in other parts of the world could be 



given. 7 



Accustomed as we are to our excellent vegetables and luscious 

 fruits, we can hardly persuade ourselves that the stringy roots 

 of the wild carrot and parsnip, or the little shoots of the wild 

 asparagus, or crabs, sloes, &c, should ever have been valued ; 

 yet, from what we know of the habits of Australian and South 

 African savages, we need feel no doubt on this head. The in- 

 habitants of Switzerland during the Stone-period largely col- 

 lected wild crabs, sloes, bullaces, hips of roses, elderberries, 

 beech-mast, and other wild berries and fruit. 8 Jemmy Button, 

 a Fuegian on board the Beagle, remarked to me that the poor 

 and acid black-currants of Tierra del Fuego were too sweet 

 for his taste. 



The savage inhabitants of each land, having found out by 

 many and hard trials what plants were useful, or could be 

 rendered useful by various cooking processes, would after a 

 time take the first step in cultivation by planting them near 

 their usual abodes. Livingstone 9 states that the savage Batokas 

 sometimes left wild fruit-trees standing in their gardens, and 

 occasionally even planted them, " a practice seen nowhere else 

 amongst the natives." But Du Chaillu saw a palm and some 

 other wild fruit-trees which had been planted ; and these trees 

 were considered private property. The next step in cultivation, 

 and this would require but little forethought, would be to sow 



7 As in both North and South America. ing to distinct families. 

 Mr. Edgeworth (' Journal Proc. Linn. 8 Prof. 0. Heer, ' Die Pflanzen der 



Soc.,' vol. vi. Bot, 1862, p. 181) states Pfahlbauten, 1865, aus dem Neujahr. 



that in the deserts of the Punjab poor Naturforsc. Gesellschaft,' 1866 ; and 



women sweep up, "by a whisk into Dr. H. Christ, in Kiitimeyer's 'Die 



straw baskets/' the seeds of four genera Fauna der Pfahlbauten,' 1861, s. 226. 

 of grasses, namely, of Agrostis, Panicum, 9 'Travels,' p. 535. Du Chaillu, 



Cenchrus, and Pennisetum, as well as ' Adventures in Equatorial Africa,' 1861, 



the seeds of four other genera belong- p. 445. 



