86 



Had I been desirous of enlarging the limits of this 

 Mork I might have given a very copious enumera- 

 tion of the plants of Chili ; but I prefer confining 

 myself to those only which are most important and 

 useful. As these may be reduced to a small num- 

 ber, I have divided them into herbs, grasses,* climb- 

 ing plants, shrubs and trees. I am aware that this 

 division is not scientific, but it is convenient, and 

 better suited to the plan I have pursued in my de- 

 scription of vegetables. 



Sect. I. Herbs, — Many of the plants which are 

 found in the country, such as the mallows, trefoil, 

 plaintain, endive, mint, nettles, Stc. are common 

 both to Chili and to Europe. Others that are care- 

 fully cultivated in the European gardens grow natu- 

 rally there, such as lupins, love apples, Spanish pi- 

 mento, celery, cresses, mustard, fennel, ^cf. Of 

 the tropical plants, several succeed very well in the 

 northern provinces, among which are the sugar-cane, 

 the pine -apple, the cotton, the banana, the sweet po- 



* I have rendered grasses what the author has called in Italian 

 canna (^reeds) Fr. Trans, 



t All onr plants are cultivated there without difficulty, and pro- 

 duce abundantly, and there are some that grow naturally in the 

 fields, as the turnip succory, endive, &c. Nor are the aromatic 

 herbs less common, as balm, mug-wort, camomile, and a kind of 

 mouse-ear, which has the smell of a hyacinth ; the alkengi, or 

 winter-cherry, whose fruit is more odoriferous than that of France ; 

 a species of sage, called by the Indians palghi^ that grows like a 

 shrub, with a leaf resembling rosemary and an odour like Hungary 

 water. Roses grow naturally upon the hills, the most common 

 kind are entirely destitute of thorns, or have but a very few. Id 



