50 ANIMAL FOOD EESOUECES OF DIFFERENT NATIONS. 



trees, where they were pursued, and many of the 

 children were killed and eaten, and a horrible feast 

 ensued. 



Bruce relates that in his time there was still alive a 

 man of the name of Matthews, who was present at a 

 banquet of human flesh on the west coast of Africa, to 

 the north of Senegal. Srielgrave fixes the stigma on 

 the kingdom of Dahomey, and says that although he 

 did not actually see it, his not doing so was solely due 

 to his having been so thoroughly sickened by the pre- 

 vious atrocities of the horrible customs of which the 

 banquet was to be the appropriate wind-up, that he 

 could stand it no longer, and was glad to escape from 

 the dreadful scene. 



Norris corroborates him, but still not from personal 

 observation, and Stedman, in his narrative of Surinam, 

 quotes with an almost suspicious profusion of circum- 

 stantial details, the reports of the Africans : — 



" I should not forget," he observes, " to mention that 

 the Gango negroes are supposed to be anthropophagi or 

 cannibals, like the Oaribbee Indians, instigated by habi- 

 tual and implacable revenge. Among the rebels of this 

 tribe, after the taking of Boucou, some pots were found 

 on the fire with human flesh, which one of the officers 

 had the curiosity to taste, and declared it not inferior to 

 some kinds of beef or pork. I have since been assured 

 by a Mr. Vangills, an American, that having travelled 

 for a great number of miles inland in Africa, he at length 

 came to a place where human legs, arms, and thighs hung 

 upon wooden shambles, and were exposed for sale like 

 butchers' meat in Leadenhall Market." 



Cameron, in his work " Across Africa," speaking of 

 the inhabitants of the district of Manyuema, states that 

 they are filthy cannibals. 



" Not only do they eat the bodies of enemies killed in 

 battle, but also of people who die of disease. They pre- 

 pare the corpses by leaving them in running water until 

 they are nearly putrid, and then devour them without 

 any further cooking. They also eat all sorts of carrion, 



