272 
On the Cultivated Potato. 
mountains of Malvarco, where Pincheira's soldiers went to fetch them for 
food. These evidences sufficiently prove the potato to be indigenous in Chili, 
without mentioning the less convincing ones of Molina and Meyen, whose 
specimens from Chili have not been examined. 
The climate of the Chilian coast prevails on the heights along the Andes, 
and in the temperate regions of Peru the cultivation of the potato is very 
ancient, but the spontaneity of the species is much less palpable than iu 
Chili. Pavon protested he had found it on the coast at Chancay and near 
Lima. These localities seem very hot for a plant which demands a temperate 
or rather cold climate. The specimen in Mr. Boissier's herbarium, collected 
by Pavon, moreover, belongs, according to Dunal, to a different kind, which 
he calls Solanum immite. I have seen the authentic specimen, and have no 
doubt that it is a species quite distinct from the S. tuberosum. Sir W. 
Hooker mentions a specimen of MacLean, from the hills about Lima, without 
giving any information as to its spontaneity. The specimens (more or less 
wild?) which Matthews sent to Sir W. Hooker from Peru, belong, according 
to Sir Joseph, to some varieties differing a little from the real potato. Mr. 
Hemslev, who saw them recently in the Herbarium at Kew, thinks " they are 
distinct forms, yet no more than varieties of the species." 
Weddell, whose caution in this matter is well known, thus expresses 
himself : — " I have never met with the Solanum tuberosum in Peru in such 
circumstances as to leave no doubt about its being indigenous ; I even 
declare that I do not believe in the spontaneity of other specimens found 
here and there in the Andes beyond Chili, and considered until now as 
indigenous." 
On the other hand, M. Ed. Andre has collected with great care, in two 
elevated and wild spots of Columbia, and in another near Lima, on the 
mountain of the Amancaes, some specimens which he thought he could class 
with the S. tuberosum. M. Andre has had the kindness to lend me them, 
and I have compared them attentively with the types of Dunal's specimens 
in my herbarium, and M. Boissier's. Not one of these Solanum belongs, in 
my opinion, to the S. tuberosum, though that from La Union, near the river 
Cauca, resembles it more than the others, and what is more certain still, not 
one of them corresponds with Dunal's S. immite. They are nearer the 
S. Columhianurn than the tuberosum or immite. The specimen from Mount 
Quindio presents a very peculiar feature; it has ovoid and pointed berries. 
In Mexico it seems that the tuberous Solaniem, ascribed t-o the S. tubero- 
sum, or, according to Mr. Hemsley, to kindred species, cannot be considered 
as identical with the kind which is cultivated. They are related to the 
*S'. Fendleri, which Asa Gray considered at first as a true species, and 
afterwards as a variety of the S. tuberosum or of the S. verrucosum. 
We may draw the following conclusions : — 
1. The potato is indigenous in Chili, in a form which is still seen in our 
cultivated plants. 
2. It is very doubtful wliether its natural habitat extends as f;ir as Peru 
and New Granada. 
3. The cultivation was spread before the discovery of America from Chili 
to New Granada. 
4. It had been introduced, probably iti the second lialf of the sixteenth 
century, into that part of the Unitc<l States which we call Virginia and 
North Carolina. 
5. It was im]X)rted into Europe from 1580-1585, first by the Spaniards, 
then by the English, at the time of Raleigh's voyages to Virginia. 
De Candolle having presented to my readers a most instructive 
view of the general history of the potato, it seems to me that an 
