wa_, which are also in the
Algonkian languages. The fact that the Hurons, apparently the first
Indians to plant tobacco, have no native word for the plant is
significant. It shows that the Hurons learned to smoke from the
Arawaks or Caribs, then already under Negro influence, and at a time
prior to the introduction of the tobacco-plant into Canada by the
French. When we consider, then, that tobacco is native to Africa, that
_tubb[=a]q_ and _petun_ are the ancestors of the Indian names for the
weed, that by 1503, Negroes in large numbers were living in America,
deserting their masters to join the Indians, that the Negroes in
America smoked and raised tobacco, the conclusion is inescapable that
tobacco smoking was discovered and taught by them to the Indians and
the Europeans.

"The tobacco-pipe in America," says Professor Wiener, "began its
career as a Mandingo amulet" (p. 184). This statement will distress
the American archaeologists, but the arguments in support of it cannot
be overcome. A counter-claim of pre-Columbian antiquity for pipes
found in the mounds cannot be made, since it is so clearly shown that
the mounds are not prehistoric, but were fortifications erected along
the lines of communication from Florida to the Huron country, to
protect the overland trade established in the beginning of the
sixteenth century.

In the _Journal of the First Voyage_, we find mention of _ajes_ and
_niames_, as name of edible roots, but the account hopelessly confuses
reports of yams, sweet potatoes and manioc. Neither yams nor sweet
potatoes are native to America, and both bear in America, only African
names. Oviedo indeed, says distinctly, that the _name_ is "a foreign
fruit, and not native to these Indies,"--also, that "it came with that
evil lot of Negroes, ... of whom there is a greater number than is
necessary, on account of their rebellions" (pp. 203-4). Now in Africa
the yam (Dioscorea), cultivated before the coming of the Europeans, is
known by names derived from Arabic _arum_ and _gambah_, _e.g._, Ewe
_ad[>e]_, _ad[>z]e_, Mandingo _nyambe_, Malinke _nyeme ku_,--whence
the supposed Indian names, _aje_, _age_, _niame_, _igname_, used
indiscriminately of any edible roots. The African names of the manioc
have come from Arabic _'uruq_ "roots," notably in the Congo languages,
_y[=o]ka_, _y[=e]ke_, _edioko_, plural _madioka_, whence, as the plant
was introduced into America, it was known there as _vuca_, _mandioca_.
As to