When first known to the Spaniards, the Chilese were an agricultural people, dependent for their subsistence on the cultivation of such nutritious plants as accident or necessity had made them acquainted with.  The plants chiefly cultivated by them for subsistence were maize, magu, guegen, tuca, quinoa, pulse of various kinds, the potatoe, oxalis tuberosa, common and yellow pumpkin or gourd, guinea pepper, madi, and the great strawberry; of each of which it may be proper to give a short account[57].

[Footnote 57:  The following account of the plants cultivated by the Chilese for food, is extracted from the natural history of Chili by Molina; but the enumeration from the text of his civil history will be found to differ materially from that given from the natural history of the same author.—­E.]

Maize or Turkey wheat, the Zea mais of botanists, is called gua by the Chilese.  It grows extremely well in Chili, where the inhabitants cultivate eight or nine distinct varieties.  The kind in highest repute is called uminta, from which the natives prepare a dish by bruising the corn, while in a green unripe state, between two stones into a kind of paste, which they season with salt, sugar, and butter.  This paste is then divided into small portions, which are separately inclosed in the skin or husk of the corn, and boiled for use.  When ripe, the maize is prepared for winter use, either by slightly roasting, or by drying in the sun.  From the former, named chuchoca, a kind of soup is prepared by boiling with water:  From the latter they make a very pleasant beer or fermented liquor.  The maize is sometimes reduced to meal by grinding between two stones, being previously parched or roasted by means of heated sand.  For this purpose they prefer a variety of maize named curagua, which is smaller than the other, and produces a lighter and whiter meal, and in larger quantity.  With this meal, mixed with sugar and water, they make two different beverages, named ulpo and cherchan.

Magu a species of rye, and tuca, a species of barley, were cultivated by the Chilese before the coming of the Spaniards to that country; but have been entirely neglected since the introduction of European wheat.  They are still used however by the Araucanians, who make from them a kind of bread called couvue, which name they likewise give to bread made from maize or wheat.

Quinua is a species of Chenopodium/, having a black twisted grain of a lenticular form, from which they prepare a stomachic beverage of a pleasant taste.  A variety of this plant, named dahue, produces white seeds, which lengthen out when boiled like worms, and are excellent in soup.  The leaves of the quinoa have an agreeable taste, and are eaten by the natives.

Degul is a species of bean, of which the Chilese cultivated thirteen or fourteen kinds before the arrival of the Spaniards, differing but little from the common European bean or Phaseolus vulgaris, one of them having a straight stalk, and all the rest climbers[58].