270 Mr. W. S. MacLeay's Notes on Capromys. 



day overspread and settled the islands and continent of America. Oviedo 

 was born at Madrid in 1478, and was sent out to the New World by 

 Ferdinand of Arragon, in 1513, as his inspector of the gold ore works on 

 the Costa Firme. From this time he served for several years in various 

 parts of America and the West Indies, either in a military or civil 

 capacity. In 1525 he wrote his very curious work, which was first 

 printed at Seville in 1535. We consequently have in Oviedo's History 

 the account by an eye witness of the state of the Spanish settlements 

 thirty-three years after the first discovery of the New World by Colum- 

 bus. When to this it is added that ovu" author gives very detailed 

 accounts of the manners and customs of the indigenous inhabitants of 

 Cuba, St. Domingo, and Jamaica, a race now extinct ; of the natural 

 history of these islands ; and of the state of the Spanish plantations of 

 sugar, cassia, &c. ; I am sure I need not say more on the value of 

 the work as a book of reference.* 



Having now three species of Capromys alive in my garden, and ready 

 to be sent by the first opportunity to the Zoological Society, I shall avail 

 myself of the information to be found in Oviedo, to correct some of the 

 absurd errors which have been lately propagated on the subject of this 

 genus. The history of the Hutia, as lately detailed by Desmarest in the 

 " Mimoires de la Societe d'Histoire Naturelle,''^ and of which a trans- 

 lation appeared in the first volume of the Zoological Journal, is subject 

 to the charge of inaccuracy, which proceeds however from his not having 

 been able to refer to this work of Oviedo, from which all the accounts of 

 the Hutia by other writers are borrowed. 



M. Desmarest says " Je trouvai d'abord dans le dictionnaire de Bo- 

 *' mare que ' V Utias est une espece de lapin de la grandeur d'un Rat qui 

 habite les Incles Occidentales, et que Von chasse la nuit en s'eelairant 

 avec un insecte lumineux nomme Acudia :^ sans doute," says M. Des- 

 marest, " VEhier noctilucus que M. Fournier a rapporte tres abondam- 

 " ment de Cuba." This marvellous story of a quadruped being hunted 

 at night by the light of an insect,-}- excited my curiosity, and as, since 



* Mr. Washington Irving considers Oviedo in the historical parts of his 

 work to be partial; but however this may be, it in no way affects his descrip- 

 tion of the country and its productions. 

 ■J- See Zoological Journal, Vol. I, p. 81. 



