142 SUPPLEMENTAL HISTORY OP MAN. 



human species. The rudest barbarians with whom 

 we are acquainted, who are scattered at wide inter- 

 vals along* the shores of Australasia, derive their 

 support chiefly from the sea. Their diet is occa- 

 sionally varied, by the flesh of kangaroos or of birds. 

 Sometimes they get a few roots, mix them with 

 nuts or the larvae of insects, and thus form a kind 

 of paste. 



The Greenlanders, the natives of the Kurile 

 islands, $-c, the wandering* hordes of Asia, and the 

 American hunters are all carnivorous. 



Reasoning on this principle we may conclude 

 that earth is a natural food of man, if we regard the 

 practice of some very savage nations. A kind of 

 unctuous clay forms the principal food of some In- 

 dian tribes, on the banks of the Meta and the Ori- 

 noco. The same practice has been observed in 

 Africa, and in other places. The Otomacs, as Hum- 

 boldt informs us, live ordinarily on fish, but during 

 the period of the overflowing of the Orinoco, 

 when, from that cause their supply is stopped, they 

 swallow every day, during several months, very 

 considerable quantities of an unctuous sort of 

 clay which they provide for the occasion, and 

 preserve stacked in balls of about six inches in 

 diameter. 



But, surely, it is monstrously absurd to call bar- 

 barism, the natural state of man. The very essence 

 of man's being is a capacity of improvement and 

 civilization. Reason was bestowed on him by the 

 Author of his existence, to form a mode of life suit- 



