234 ANIMAL FOOD RESOURCES OP DIFFERENT NATIONS. 



not having eaten of the flesh of the alligator, and in- 

 deed I felt a little ashamed of my squeamishness when 

 I was shown by the same friend a passage in a French 

 writer, whose name I forget, in which he speaks favour- 

 ably of this flesh. However, if the advocate for ex- 

 perimental eating had seen an alligator cut into slices, 

 he would, I think, have turned from the sight as quickly 

 as I did." 



Waterton, speaking of his negro Quashi, says, " He 

 had a brave stomach for heterogeneous food ; it could 

 digest and relish too, cayman, monkies, hawks and 

 grubs. He made three or four meals oif a cayman, 

 while it was not absolutely putrid, and salted the rest." 

 A cayman boiled was found sweet and tender, and 

 Waterton remarks, he does not see why it should not be 

 as good as frog or veal. 



The Rev. Mr. Haensel, in his "Letters on the Nicobar 

 Islands," tells us that " Part of the flesh of the crocodile 

 or cayman is good and wholesome when well cooked. 

 It tastes somewhat like pork, for which I took it, and 

 ate it with much relish when I first came to Nancan- 

 weny, till on inquiry, finding it to be the flesh of a 

 beast so disgusting and horrible in its appearance and 

 habits, I felt a loathing, which I could never overcome • 

 but it is eaten by both natives and Europeans." 



The aboriginal natives of Trinidad considered a boiled 

 slice of alligator as a dainty morsel, and Mr. Joseph, the 

 historian, records having tasted it, and found it very 

 palatable. 



The Indians relish the white and savoury flesh of the 

 yecare, as it is called in South America, the spectacled 

 cayman (^Alligator sclerops) although it is dry and coarse. 

 The flesh and fat are occasionally eaten by natives in 

 Africa and other parts. 



Alligators are killed in large numbers in the South 

 American lakes and parts of the River Amazon for 

 their fat. Mr. Wallace, in describing an alligator hunt 

 on the lakes of Mesiana, an island lying off the mouth 

 of the Amazon, states that about eighty were killed in 



