234 



homhre del gran Conquistador, whose memoirs 

 were published by Ramusio, on the contrary, 

 highly praise chocolate, not only as an agreeable 

 drink, though prepared cold % but in particular 

 as a nutritious substance. " He who has drunk 

 one cup," says the page of Ferdinand Cortez, 

 " can travel a whole day without any other food, 

 especially in very hot climates ; for chocolate is 

 hy Us nature cold and refreshing." We shall 

 not subscribe to the latter part of this assertion ; 

 but we shall soon have occasion, in our voyage 

 on the Oroonoko, and our excursions toward 

 the summit of the Cordilleras, to celebrate the 

 salutary properties of chocolate. Alike easy to 

 convey, and employ as an aliment, it contains a 

 large quantity of nutritive and stimulating par- 

 ticles in a small compass. It has been said 

 with truth, that in Africa, rice, gum, and shea 

 butter, assist man in crossing the deserts. In 

 the New World, chocolate and the flower of 

 maize have rendered accessible to him the table- 

 lands of the Andes, and vast uninhabited 

 forests. 



The cacao-harvest is extremely variable. The 

 tree vegetates with such strength, that flowers 



* Father Gili has very clearly shown, from two passages 

 in Torquemado (Monarquia Indiana, lib. xiv, cap. 14 et 42), 

 that the Mexicans prepared the infusion cold ; and that the 

 Spaniards have introduced the custom of preparing chocolate 



by boiling water with the paste of cacao. 



