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to designate the vegetables that are most use- 

 ful to man, and that are common both to the 



the 15th century, and a great part of which are not uninter- 

 esting to descriptive botany* Ahi (capsicum baccatum), ba- 

 tata (convolvulus batatas), bihao (heliconia bihai), caimito 

 (chrysophyllum caimito), cahoba (swietenia mahagoni), jacca 

 and casabi (iatropha manihot - f the word casabi or cassave is 

 employed only for the bread made with the roots of the ia- 

 tropha ; the name of the plant, jucca, was also heard by 

 Americus Vespucius on the coast of Paria), age or ajes (dios- 

 corea alata), copei (clusia alba), guayacan (guaiacum officinale), 

 guajaba (psidium pyriferum), guanavano (anona muricata), 

 mani (arachis hypogcea,) guama (inga) , henequen (was suppos- 

 ed by the false accounts of the first travellers to be an herb, 

 with which the Haytians used to cut metals j it means now 

 every kind of strong thread), hicaco (chrysobalanus icaco), 

 maghei (agave Americana), mahiz or maiz (zea), mamei (mam- 

 mea Americana) , mangle (rhizophora), pitahaja (cactus pitaha- 

 ja), ceiba (bombax), tuna (cactus tuna), hicotea (a tortoise), 

 iguana (Iacerta iguana), manati (trichecus manati), nigua (pu- 

 lex penetrans), hamaca (a hammock), balsa (a raft j however 

 balsa is an ancient Castilian word signifying a pool of water), 

 Barbacoa (a small bed of light wood, or reeds), caneior buhio 

 (a hut), canoa (a boat), cocujo (elater noctilucus), chicha, 

 tschischa (fermented liquor), macana (a large stick or club, 

 made with the petioles of a palm-tree), tabaco (not the herb, 

 but the pipe through which it is smoked), cazique (a chief). 

 Other American words, now as much in use among the 

 Creoles, as the Arabic words naturalized in the Spanish, do 

 not belong to the Haitian tongue ; for example, caiman, pi- 

 ragua, papaja (carica), aguacate (persea), tarabita, paramo. 

 Abbe* Gili thinks with some probability, that they are de- 

 rived from the tongue of some people, who inhabited the 

 temperate climate between Coro, the mountains of Merida, 

 VOL. III. T 



