Chili

Declaracion de la partida primera de la plana siguiente de lo figurado. El muchacho ó muchacha de onze años, que no recibia correccion de palabra, sus padres los castigavan dandoles humo en las narizes con axi, que hera un tormento grave y cruel, para que se castigasen, y no handuviesen viciados é vagamundos, si no que se aplicasen en ocupar el tiempo en cosas provechosas. A los muchachos de tal edad dabanles el pan, que son tortillas, por tasa solamente una tortilla y media, á cada comida, por que no se enseñasen à ser tragones ó glotones.

This explains the first section of the next page. If a boy or girl of eleven would not take correction from words, the parents punished them by making them breathe chili smoke through the nose. It was a harsh and cruel torment. It was meant to make them mend their ways, so that they would not grow up wicked and idle wanderers but would spend their time on useful things. Boys of this age got their bread, which is tortillas, by a fixed measure: only a tortilla and a half at each meal, so that they would not learn to be greedy eaters.

1. Estas onze pintas de azul significan onze años. 2. Una tortilla y media. 3. Padre de los muchachos de esta hazera. 4. Muchacho de once años que su padre le está castigando, dandole humo por las narizes, con axi seco. 5. Saumerio ó humazo de axi. 6. Madre de las muchachas de esta hazera. 7. Muchacha de once años que su madre la está castigando, queriendola dar humo con axi. 8. Una tortilla y media. 9. Saumerio de axi.

1. These eleven blue dots mean eleven years. 2. A tortilla and a half. 3. The father of the boys in this row. 4. A boy of eleven. His father is punishing him by making him breathe the smoke of dried chilies through his nose. 5. The chili smoke. 6. The mother of the girls in this row. 7. A girl of eleven. Her mother is punishing her and is about to hold her in the chili smoke. 8. A tortilla and a half. 9. Chili smoke.

CHILLI, seu Piper Mexicanum, planta est ferens siliquas illas, quæ ab Haitinis Agies, ab antiquis, vt quidam volunt, siliquastra, & ab Hispanis Piper Indicum vocatur, & Capsicum ab Actuario nuncupatur. quæ licet diù in nostrum orbem translata sit, ibiq; & in hortis, & in vasis fictilibus, ornamenti & vsus gratia seratur, & habeatur in delicijs, tamen quoniam apud Indos multo plura eorum genera reperiuntur, & orexi excitandæ, commendandisq; ferculis suppetias ferat, adeo vt nullam sit reperire mensam sine Chilli, atque ideo quotidiano experimento sint illius facultates notissimæ, adductus sum non modo differentias, quæ in noua Hispania proueniunt, de quibus modo agitur, verum specierum fere omnium, quæ adhuc ad manus nostras peruenerunt, exhibere imagines, formas describere, vniuersamq; facultatem, & naturam tradere posteritati.

Chilli, or Mexican pepper, is the plant that bears the pods that the people of Haiti call agies, which some say the ancients called siliquastrum, the Spaniards call Indian pepper, and Actuarius named capsicum. It was brought to our part of the world long ago, and there it is grown in gardens and in pots, for ornament and use, and is much prized. Yet the Indians have many more kinds of it. It so stirs the appetite and makes dishes tasty that no table is found without chilli, and its powers are well known from daily experience. So I have decided to show not only the kinds that grow in New Spain, which are my subject here, but pictures of almost all the kinds that have come into our hands so far, to describe their forms, and to pass on to later times all their powers and nature.

Cunctorum ergo generum folia Solano similia sunt, & pene paria (si Quauhchilli excipias, quæ minora eadem fert) & flores candidi. è quibus siliquæ oriuntur, primo virides, mox maiori ex parte in rubrum, & demum in passeum inclinantes colorem, refertæ paruo semine, exili, candicante, contuso, atque in orbem efformato, acris gustus, atque vrentis naturæ; quæ ad semen præcipue attinet. Quartum hæ caloris gradum attingunt, & tertium fere siccitatis. etsi recentes excrementitio quodam humore abundant, qui totus pene vetustate euanescit.

The leaves of all the kinds are like nightshade and nearly the same size, except those of quauhchilli, which are smaller. The flowers are white. From them grow pods, green at first, then mostly turning red and at last the color of raisins. They are full of small, thin, whitish seeds, flat and round, sharp to the taste and burning in nature; the seed above all is like this. The pods reach the fourth degree of heat and about the third of dryness, although when fresh they are full of a waste moisture, which almost all disappears with age.