1 28 NATURAL HISTORY OF AQUATIC ANIMALS. 



according to my notion, is preferable to that of the Hakluyt Society. Having alluded to its small 

 eye, but quick ear, and to other characteristics of its organization, he says: 



"The flesh of this creature is excellent, very wholesome, and tastes very much like veal of 

 Europe, when young: for the biggest are not so delicate and agreeable to the palate. Their fat is 

 hard, and very sweet, as that of onr hogs; the flesh resembles veal. It dies with very little loss 

 of blood, and is not observ'd to come upon dry land; nor is there any likelihood it should, 

 considering its shape, as in the cut, whence it is concluded not to be amphibious. 



"The Spaniards about the island of St. Margaret, or Maryarita, called the Manati Pcce-Bury, 

 that is, Ox Fish; and particularly value the stomach and belly part of it, roasted on spits. Others 

 cut long slices of the flesh of its back, which they salt a little, only for two days, and then dry it 

 in the air; after which it will keep three or four months. This they roast and baste with butter, 

 and reckon delicious meat. A gentleman has assur'd me, that at Jamaica they give eighteen pence 

 a pound for young Manati. At Cayenne it yields but three pence a pound salted. 



" F. Christopher de Acunna, in the relation of his voyage on the river of the Amazon*, chap. 25, 

 describes this fish as follows: 



"The Pece-Buey, says he, is of a delicious taste; any one that eats it, would think it to be 

 most excellent flesh well season'd. This fish is as big as a heifer of a year and a half old; it has a 

 head and ears just like those of a heifer, and the body of it is all cover'd with hair, like the bristles 

 of a white hog; it swims with two little amis, and under its belly has teats, with which it suckles 

 its young ones. The skin of it is very thick, and when dressed into leather, serves to make 

 targets, which are proof against a musket bullet. It feeds upon grass, on the bank of the river, 

 like an ox; from which it receives so good nourishment, and is of so pleasant taste, that a man is 

 more strengthen'd and better satisfy'd with eating a small quantity of it, than with twice as 

 much mutton. 



"It has not a free respiration in the water, and therefore often thrusts out its snout to take 

 breath, and so is disco ver'd by them that seek after it. When the Indians get sight of it they 

 follow it with their oars in little canoes; and when it appears above wa(pr to take breath, cast their 

 harping-tools made of shells, with which they stop its course, and take it. When they have 

 kill'd it, they cut it into pieces, and dry it upon wooden grates, which they call Boucan; and thus 

 dressed, it will keep good above a month. They have not the way of salting and drying it to keep 

 a long while, for want of plenty of salt; that which they use to season their meat being very scarce, 

 and made of the ashes of a sort of palm-tree, so that it is more like salt-petre than common salt." 1 



For the Romanist of South America the Manatee is, as the old voyagers persisted in calling it, 

 a fish. It is, therefore, eaten on days when a meat diet is forbidden by the rites of the church. 



CONCLUSION. In the Manatee, then, we have an animal of great size, of gentle disposition 

 and apparently of rapid growth, which lives in places readily accessible to man, and is easily 

 captured, and which furnishes meat which is not inferior, oil which is remarkably fine, and 

 leather which possesses great toughness. From these considerations it would seem evident that, 

 with the proper protection, it would furnish no small revenue to the people in those portions of 

 our country which it inhabits, for centuries to come. 



32. THE ARCTIC SEA-COW. 



THE EXTINCTION ov SPECIES IN HISTORICAL TIME. The catalogue of animals which are 

 known to have become extinct within historical times is not a long one. I do not allude, of 



1 BAHBOT: A Description of tint Island of Cayenne, in Appendix to Description of the t'onstx of Not-ill and South 

 Guinea, I ;::.', p. 563. 



