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ponds with the carnage made every year in the 

 grotto by the Indians. It appears, that they do 

 not get above 150 or 160 bottles* of very pure 

 manteca ; the rest, less transparent, is preserved 

 in large earthen vessels. This branch of in- 

 dustry reminds us of the harvest of pigeons' 

 oil -f-, of which some thousands of barrels were 

 formerly collected at Carolina. At Caripe, the 

 use of the oil of guacharoes is very ancient, and 

 the missionaries have only regulated the method 

 of extracting it. The members of an Indian 

 family, which bears the name of Morocoymas 

 pretend, as descendants of the first colonists of 

 the valley, to be the lawful proprietors of the 

 cavern, and arrogate to themselves the mono- 

 poly of the fat ; but, thanks to the monastic in- 

 stitutions, their rights at present are merely 

 honorary. In conformity to the system of the 

 missionaries, the Indians are obliged to furnish 

 guacharo-oil for the church lamp : the rest, we 

 were assured, is purchased of them. We shall 

 not decide either on the legitimacy of the rights 

 of the Morocoymas, or on the origin of the ob- 

 ligation imposed on the natives by the monks. 

 It would seem natural, that the produce of the 

 chace should belong to those who hunt : but in 

 the forests of the New World, as in the centre of 



* Sixty cubic inches each. 



f This pigeon oil comes from the columba migratoria 

 (Pennant's Arctic Zoology, T. 2, p. 13). 

 VOL. III. K 



