OF VAX DIEMEX'S LAND. 165 



the white grub, which is also found in rotten timber. 

 Of the latter the natives are extravagantly fond, eating 

 them raw as well as roasted. A species of truffle, known 

 in the colony by the name of native bread, found in the 

 vicinity of decayed wood, and of the order of Fungi, is a 

 favourite article of food ; so also is a large lizard, often 

 twelve or fourteen inches in length, and called the iguana. 



A custom prevails amongst them for which I can 

 assign no reason, nor do they seem themselves able to 

 give any. Some will eat only the male of a particular 

 species, others only the female ; and 1 am assured by 

 those who know well their habits, that they will rather 

 starve than infringe this rule. The morning we arrived 

 at Pea-jacket, a wallaby was taken by Tommy, at a 

 time when meat was by no means plentiful ; he, however, 

 gave the whole of it away, nor could I induce him to 

 taste it. It was a male, and the only answer 1 could get 

 from him was that he never ate the male of that animal. 

 The rest of the party partook of it. Butter, or food that 

 is fat or greasy, they show at first an aversion to ; the 

 animals that inhabit the forest, especially the kangaroo 

 and wallaby, are generally lean. 



They seem to have been acquainted with no other 

 mode of cooking than that of roasting. Boiling was 

 quite strange to them, and meat prepared in that way 

 appears less agreeable to them than the other. The plan 

 they adopt in cooking mutton-birds is, to throw the bird 

 on the fire until all the feathers are singed off, when it is 

 withdrawn and gutted. When several are prepared in 

 this manner, they are spitted on a stick between two and 

 three feet in length, one end of which is run into the 

 ground, while the other enables the person who is stand- 

 ing by to turn the birds, or give them such a direction 

 towards the fire as ensures their being properly cooked. 



The animals were cooked in the usual summary 

 method ; first, by throwing them on the fire until the 

 hair was singed, after which the entrails were extracted, 

 and the carcase returned to the fire until sufficiently 

 roasted. The eggs were also roasted among the embers. 

 They cooked the shell-fish (Haliotis, or mutton-fish) very 

 nicely by placing them on the embers with the fish 

 uppermost until they are roasted. They then insert the 

 end of a long stick into the fish, which readily leaves the 

 shell ; and, were there no better fare, we should have 



