and three sixteenths inch thick, which is baked on a slightly concave earthenware [or iron] pan. The cakes so made are called _tortillas_, and are very nutritious. When travelling, I preferred them myself to bread made from wheaten flour. When well made and eaten warm, they are very palatable.” Besides the importance of this grain for human food, it is necessary for the horses, who could not well endure the hard steep roads on sacate alone. Much might be exported to the neighboring republics. _Wheat._—Throughout the uplands much wheat is grown. The straw is generally small, but the grain heavy and good. In the grain centres, such as Sololà, the wheat is inspected and weighed by Government officials. The seed is sown in drills rather than broadcast. I found the bread made from this home wheat of a uniformly good quality, though sometimes dark colored,—indeed it is superior to the bread found in the country throughout the United States. _Potatoes, and other Food-Plants._—However the philosopher may try to confine his attention to those products of a country which may have a commercial value, be he cynic or epicurean he will be interested in those fruits and vegetables not necessary to the support of life, but none the less very important factors in human comfort. I have briefly noticed the principal fruits that may be exported from Guatemala, and have passed unnoticed the scores of valuable woods, because I can add nothing to the general knowledge of these. For the same reason I have omitted the hundred and one drugs or medicinal plants; but I should fail in my duty to this pleasant country if I did not tell of some of those fruits and vegetables that add to the pleasure of life. The common potato I have already mentioned in a former chapter (p. 136). The sweet potato (_Batatas edulis_) will grow in all its varieties, from the huge purple-fleshed tuber to the delicate little yellow form; but it is very little cultivated. The yam (_Dioscorea_) is much more common, but dry and tasteless. The cocos or kalo (_Colocasium esculentum_) grows well in the wetter lands, but is more common in Belize than in Guatemala, and in neither place attains the prominence as a vegetable that it enjoys in the Pacific Islands or in China and the East Indies. The cassava (_Manihot utilissima_), so important a food in South America, is here mostly confined to Carib use, and I have never seen it inland or on the south coast; as a dietary its importance merits attention, and it should be exported. In a dry climate it keeps well, and I have specimens four years old still perfectly good. Frijoles, or beans, black, white, and red, are very abundant and good. The Mexicans are the greatest consumers of beans in the world, and their neighbors southward probably rank next.