TRIL-CENTENARY OF THE POTATO.

New Zealand Times, Volume LVIII, Issue 2851, 20 June 1896, Page 2 (Supplement)

TRIL-CENTENARY OF THE POTATO.

Some Facts and Fancies About a Most Im portaut Article of Human Wet.

Tile tri-centenary of the introduction of the potato is to be celebrated in England this year, for it was in ISfiG, exactly three centuries ago, that Sir Walter Raleigh planted the first Irish potato in his at Youghal, near Cork. A month later his example was followed in Hoi born, England. It is a singular fact that an insignificant plant, with no beauty of leaves or flowers, with a nauseous odour and a

JUICE OF A POISONOUS QUALITY, growing wild among the crevices of the rocks which bound the shores of Peru and Chili, unknown to the world at large, and all but neglected by'the rude natives, should have been transferred three centuries ago to Europe, eventually to become one of tho most important articles of human diet and largely influence the population of half the globe. The potato belongs to a family of plants botanioally known as the Solanaceso, which includes the deadly nightshade and other poisonous plants. The juice of its own leaves and stems, and even of the skins of its tubers, is slightly poisonous. In its native state the plant is small, and the tubers rarely exceed the size of a walnut or common chestnut. They are also of a moist, waxy consistence, and have a slightly bitterish taste. The colour of the blossoms is generally white, instead of the red and purple hues of tho cultivated sorts. TUBERS ARE NOT ROOTS. The tubers are not the roots of the plant, but are true underground stems, and their use in nature appears to be to afford another means of propogating the plants besides that of the seeds, which are contained in the fruit or apple. The tubers contain germinating points or eyes, just as aerial stems have leaf buds, from which young shoots spring forth. These tubers after their maturity are washed out of the soil by rains and carried by the torrents along the crevices of the rocks and into the intervening valleys, where they take root and give rise to new plants. By the careful cultivation of man, however, a new use has been developed in them. These small waxy and bitter tubers have been swelled out into large farinaceous, palatable potatoes, one single stem producing many pounds weight of a sort of food nearly resembling and little inferior to that of wheat or oats or barley. Never was such a gift bestowed on man since Ceres is fabled first to have brought the grains from heaven. But though MORE THAN THREE CENTURIES have elapsed since tbe introduction of the potato into Europe, strange to say the name of him who first introduced the root rests upon nearly as doubtful authority as that of the planters of the cerealia more than three thousand years ago, As to its introduction into Great Britain, however, there is less doubt. It is certain that the expedition sent out by Sir Walter Baleigh in 1581 first brought the tuber to England. It is almost equally certain that Sir WalterJ] Baleigh himself was the first person to plant it in British soil in tho year 1596. But it would appear that before this period the potato, under the name of batata, was known in Europe. A SL W GROWTH. Nevertheless, neither in Great Britain nor the Continent did it become immediately popular. For more than a century it languished in obscurity in England. Little known and less prized, it was confined to the gardens of the botanists and the curious, and when used at all as food, only at the tables of the rich, as a rare vegetable rather than as a standing dish. Tho potatoes furnished to the table of James I. bore the high price of two shillings per pound. In 16Si Woolridge writes of the tubers : “ I do not hear that it. has yet been essayed whether they may not lie propagated in great, quantities for the use of swine and other cattle ” Mortimer’s Garden Kalendar for 1708 says, slightingly, “ The root is very near the nature of lire Jerusalem artichoke, although not

so good and wholesome, bitt it may prove good for swine.”

SEVERAL REASONS, besides prejudice, may be given for this neglect. Cultivation hud not yet improved the wild stock to its present perfection. The proper modes of cook-, ing had not yet been hit upon. And, lastly, vegetable food of any sort was less sought after, or rather less within the reach of the mass of the people, than it is now. In time, however, the grand discovery began to be made that this esculent was primarily the poor man’s food and comfort. In Ireland, in Lancaster and the western districts of England, and in Scotland, where land was portioned out in small parts on the cotter system, the potato culture, once began, rapidly advanced and spread over the whole country, and even to the American colonies of Great Britain. potato in France. In France the potato was placed on the royal table as early as 1016'. But it was an apothecray named Parmentier who really introduced it and did all he could to have it generally cultivated more than a century and a half later. In 1771 a prize was offered by the Academy of Besangon for the discovery of a new food which should fill the place of cereals in case of a famine. Parmentier exhibited his potatoes. Louis XYI. gave him fifty morgen of land wherein to plant them. His Majesly also stuck the flowers of the potato in his buttonhole as a bouquet. Marie Antoinette placed them in her hair in the evening. Fashion ran wild after similar decorations. Parmentier’s place was inundated by princes, dukes and high functionaries. All Paris talked only of potatoes and Parmentier. The King said to the latter :—“ France will thank you some lime henci, because you have found bread for the poor.” SIR WALTER RALEIGH’S HOUSE. It is a curious and noteworty fact that the residence of - Sir Walter Raleigh, in Ireland, where he first planted the historic potato, is still extant and in good repair, and the other houses connected with his name have gone. Kilooman Castle, in Cork, is a roofless, ivy clad ruin on the estate of a descendant of the Barry, with whom Raleigh had a bitter feud. No alders are now to be seen on the banks of the Mulla, once celebrated by Spencer. The manor house at East Budleigh has disappeared. But the warden’s house of the College of Youghal, to which Raleigh took a fancy because of its resemblance to the Budleigh Manor, and which he obtained after the confiscation of the Earl of Desmond’s property, still preserves his memory. The garden which the potato was planted comprises five acres, backed by the ancient town of Youghal. The house and garden were about twenty 3 ears ago purchased by Sir John Pope Hennessey, author of the life of Raleigh, and remained in his possession until his death in 1893.