- [Footnote: "potatoes (Solanum tuberosum) bear at Usmè the native
non-Peruvian name of Yomi, and were found by Quesada already cultivated in the province of Velez as early as 1537, a period when their introduction from Chili, Peru, and Quito, would seem improbable, and therefore that the plant may be regarded as a native of New Granada" I would remark, however, that the Peruvian invasion and complete possession of Quito took place before 1525, the year of the death of the Inca Huayna Capac. The southern provinces of Quito even fell under the dominion of Tupac Inca Yupanqui at the conclusion of the 15th century (Prescott, Conquest of Peru, Vol. i. p. 332.) In the unfortunately still very obscure history of the first introduction of the potato into Europe, the merit of its introduction is still very generally attributed to Sir John Hawkins, who is supposed to have received it from Santa Fé in 1563 or 1565. It appears more certain that Sir Walter Raleigh planted the first potatoes on his Irish estate near Youghal, from whence they were taken to Lancashire. Before the conquista, the plantain (Musa), which since the arrival of the Spaniards has been cultivated in all the warmer parts of New Granada, was only found, as Colonel Acosta believes, (p. 205) at Choco. On the name Cundinamarca,—applied by a false erudition to the young republic of New Granada in 1811, a name "full of golden dreams" (sueños dorados), more properly Cundirumarca (not Cunturmarca, Garcilaso, lib. viii. cap. 2),—see also Joaquin Acosta, p. 189. Luis Daza, who joined the small invading army of the Conquistador Sebastian de Belalcazar which came from the south, had heard of a distant country abounding in gold, called]*
