NOTONECTIDiE — WATER-BOATMEN. 275 



Notonectidse — Water-boatmen. 



Humboldt mentions that he saw insects' eggs sold in the 

 markets of Mexico, which were collected on the surface of 

 lakes. Under the name of Axayacat, these eggs, or those 

 of some other species of fly, deposited on rush mats, are 

 sold as a caviare in Mexico. Rev. Thomas Smith, who 

 makes the same statement, also says the Mexicans likewise 

 eat the flies themselves, ground and made up with saltpetre. 

 Something similar to these eggs, found in the pools of the 

 desert of Fezzan, serves the Arabs for food, having the taste 

 of caviare. 



In the Bulletin de la Societe Imperiale Zoologique d'Ac- 

 climation, M. Guerin Meneville has published a paper on a 

 sort of bread which the Mexicans make of the eggs of 

 three species of heteropterous insects. 



According to M. Craveri, by whom some of the Mexican 

 bread, and of the insects yielding it, were brought to Europe, 

 these insects and their eggs are very common in the fresh 

 waters of the lagunes of Mexico. The natives cultivate, in 

 the lagune of Chalco, a sort of carex called toute, on which 

 the insects readily deposit their eggs. Numerous bundles 

 of these plants are made, which are taken to a lagune, the 

 Texcuco, where they float in great numbers in the water. 

 The insects soon come and deposit their eggs on the plants, 

 and in about a month the bundles are removed from the 

 water, dried, and then beaten over a large cloth to separate 

 the myriad of eggs with which the insects have covered 

 them. These eggs are then cleaned and sifted, put into 

 sacks like flour, and sold to the people for making a sort 

 of cake or biscuit called "hautle," which forms a tolerably 

 good food, but has a fishy taste, and is slightly acid. The 

 bundles of carex are replaced in the lake, and afford a fresh 

 supply of eggs, which process may be repeaited for an iu'deti- 

 Dite number of times. 



It appears that these insects have been used from an 

 early period, for Thomas Gage, a religionist, who sailed to 

 Mexico in 1625, says, in speaking of articles sold in the 

 markets, that they had cakes made of a sort of scum col- 

 lected from the lakes of Mexico, and that this was also sold 

 in other towns. 



Brantz Mayer, in his Mexico as it was and as it is, 1844, 



