16 
WHERE CULTIVATED PLANTS ORIGINATED. 
A great number of species originated at once in Europe and 
Western Asia, in Europe and Siberia, in the Mediterranean basin and 
Western Asia, in India and the Asiatic archipelago, in the West 
Indies and Mexico, in these two regions and Columbia, in Peru and 
Brazil or in Peru and Columbia, &c. This is a proof of the impossi¬ 
bility of subdividing the continents and of classing the islands in well- 
defined natural regions. Whatever be the method of division there 
will always be species common to two, three, four, or more regions, and 
others confined to a small portion of a single country. 
A noteworthy fact is the absence in some countries of indigenous 
cultivated plants. For instance, we have none from the arctic or 
antarctic regions, where, it is true, the floras consist of but few species. 
The United States, in spite of their vast tei’ritory, which will soon 
support hundreds of millions of inhabitants, only yields as nutritious 
plants worth cultivating the Jerusalem artichoke and the gourds. 
Zizana aquatic , which the natives gathered wild, is a grass too inferior 
to our cereals and to rice to make it worth the trouble of planting it. 
They had a few bulbs and edible berries but they have not tried to 
cultivate them, having early received the maize, which was worth far 
more. 
Patagonia and the Cape have not furnished a single species ; 
Australia and New Zealand have furnished one tree, Eucalyptus globulus, 
and a vegetable, not very nutritious, the Tetragonia. Their floras were 
entirely wanting in graminae similar to the cereals, in leguminous 
plants with edible seeds, in cruciferae with fleshy roots. In the moist 
tropical region of Australia rice and Alocasia macrorhiza have been 
found wild, or perhaps naturalised, but the greater part of the country 
suffers too much from drought to allow these species to become widely 
diffused. 
In general the austral regions had very few annuals, and among 
their restricted number none offered evident advantages. Now annual 
species are the easiest to cultivate. They have played a great part in 
the ancient agriculture of other countries. 
In short, the original distribution of cultivated species was very 
unequal. It had no proportion with the needs of man or the extent 
of territory. 
[The foregoing article is extracted from M. Alphonse de Candolle’s 
admirable new book on the “ Origin of Cultivated Plants ”—the 
latest volume of the “ International Scientific Series,” published 
by Ivegan Paul, Trench, and Co.—a volume of moderate size, 
embodying the results of much profound research, extending over 
many years, and containing much that is singularly interesting to 
botanists. We cordially commend it to all our readers, as 
deserving a place in their libraries.— Eds. Mid. Nat.] 
