Page:The food of the Gods - A Popular Account of Cocoa.djvu/161

84 The introduction of cocoa into Europe, indeed, as well as its cultivation for the European market, is due rather to the Jesuit missionaries than to the explorers of the Western Hemisphere. It was the monks, too, who about 1661 made it known in France. It is curious, therefore, to notice the contest that at one time raged among ecclesiastics as to whether it was lawful to make use of chocolate in Lent; whether it was to be regarded as food or drink. A consensus of opinion on the subject, published in Venice in 1748, states that