92 ANTIENT METAPHYSICS. Book IL 



is made of it in Jamaica, where, if the fea-breeze has ceafed for a 

 Mvo, which produces a flagnation in the air, they kindle 

 :cir hoLiics, in order to make a current of air. 



. , ak of fire, therefore, only fervcs to aggravate the mifchief 

 cf houfes and clothes, which otherwife would not be fo pernicious ;, 

 and not being a good thing in itfelf, we cannot fuppofe that Nature 

 would prompt any animal to the ufe of it. 



My next inquiry is concerning the food of this Animal. And 

 here it may be obferved, that, as Man is more a commoner of na- 

 ture than any other Animal, and deftined to live in every country 

 and climate, fo his food is more various than that of any other ; 

 for there are men that live entirely upon vegetables, others upon 

 flefh only, others upon fifli almoft entirely, which is the cafe of the 

 Efquimaux, who, though a land-animal, eats hardly any thing that 

 the land produces *. And, laftly, a great part of mankind eat all the 



three, 



* Thefe Efquimaux, with refpe£l to their diet and manner of life, are, I be- 

 lieve, the mofl extraordinary people in the world ; and, as I am very particularly 

 informed concerning them, by a man who was twenty-five years in their neighbour- 

 hood, and traflicked with them, (I mean the above mentioned Mr Graham, who 

 was fo long upon the fide of Hudfon's Bay, in the feivice of that Company), I will 

 give the reader a more authentic account of them than, I believe, has hitherto been 

 publilhed.They employ themfelves in fifhing about 4 months in the year, when the fea 

 is open ; and their chief game is the whale, which they, in fmall canoes, fuch 

 as thofe of the Greenlanders, will attack and kill with their harpoons. They 

 ;\lfo kill feals with their fpears and arrows, during the fifhing feafon. All 

 th.n time they are conftantly at fea, and live upon the flefti of the whale and of 

 the feal ; and, by way of fauce to ir, they ufe the blubber and oil of the whale ; and 

 drink the oil by way of cordial, as we take a dram. What they do not confume of 

 the flefh or blubber of the whale, or flcfli of the feal, they preferve for their winter pro- 

 vifion, in bags of feal fkins ; and upon this food they live chiefly during the eight 

 months of winter, putrid, as it may be fuppofed, and {linking, in the higheA degree, 



fo 



