1885. ] Kitchen Garden Esculents of American Origin. 545 
who reached tropical America from Spain in 1514. Clusius 
asserts the plant was brought from Pernambuco by the Portuguese 
to India, and he saw it cultivated in Moravia, in 1585." 
Hans Stade,” during his captivity in Eastern Brazil, about 
1550, says the “ pepper of the country is-of two kinds; the one 
yellow the other red; both, however, grow in like manner. When 
green it is as large as the haws that grow on hawthorns. It isa 
small shrub about half a fathom high, and has several leaves: 
it is full of peppers which burn the mouth.” G. de Vega,’ writing 
of Peru in 1609, says the most common pepper is “thick, some- 
what long, and without a point. This is called ‘ rocot uchu’ or 
‘thick pepper,’ to distinguish it from the next kind. They eat it 
green, and before it assumes its ripe color, which is red. There 
are others yellow, and others brown, though in Spain only the 
red kind has been seen. There is another kind, the length of a 
geme (5 inches ?), a little more or less, and the thickness of the 
little finger. These were considered a nobler kind, and were 
reserved for the use of the royal family. * * * * Another 
kind of pepper is small and round, exactly like a cherry with 
its stalk. They call it ‘chinchi uchu; and it burns far more than 
the others. It is grown in small quantities, and for that 
reason is the more highly esteemed.” Cieza de Leon, who 
traveled in Peru, 1532-50, speaks of the Capsicum as a favorite 
condiment of the Peruvian Indians. Molina’ says many spe- 
cies of Capsicum called by the Indians “żhapi” are cultivated 
in Chili, among others the annual, which is there perennial, 
the berry pimento and the pimento with a subligneous 
stalk. Wafer, 1699,° says on the isthmus they have two sorts of 
pepper, the one called de// pepper, the other dird pepper, and 
great quantities of each are much used by the Indians.” Each 
sort grows on a weed or shrubby bush about a yard high. The 
bird pepper has the smaller leaf, and it is by the Indians better 
esteemed than the other.” Ligon, 1647-53,’ also mentions two 
sorts in Barbadoes, “the one so like a child’s corall as not to be 
1 Pharmacog., 406. 
2 Hak. Soc. ed., p. 166, 
$ Royal Com. Hak. Soc. ed., 11, 365. 
* Hak. Soc. ed. Travels, 232, note. 
5 Hist. of Chile, ed. of 1808, 1, 95. 
6 Voy. to Isth. of Am., 100. 
7 Hist, of Barbadoes, 79. 
