272 
EXCURSIONS AROUND EGA. Chap. IY. 
proceedings is enormous. At least 6000 jars, holding 
each three gallons of the oil, are exported annually from 
the Upper Amazons and the Madeira to Para, where it 
is used for lighting, frying fish, and other purposes. It 
may be fairly estimated that 2000 more jars-full are 
consumed by the inhabitants of the villages on the 
river. Now, it takes at least twelve basketsfuU of eggs, 
or about 6000, by the wasteful process followed, to make 
one jar of oil. The total number of eggs annually de- 
stroyed amounts, therefore, to 48,000,000. As each 
turtle lays about 120, it follows that the yearly offspring 
of 400,000 turtles is thus annihilated, A vast number, 
nevertheless, remain undetected ; and these would pro- 
bably be sufficient to keep the turtle population of these 
rivers up to the mark, if the people did not follow the 
wasteful practice of lying in wait for the newly-hatched 
young, and collecting them by thousands for eating ; 
their tender flesh and the remains of yolk in their 
entrails being considered a great delicacy. The chief 
natural enemies of the turtle are vultures and alligators, 
which devour the newly-hatched young as they descend 
in shoals to the water. These must have destroyed an 
immensely greater number before the European settlers 
began to appropriate the eggs than they do now. It is 
almost doubtful if this natural persecution did not act 
as effectively in checking the increase of the turtle as 
the artificial destruction now does. If we are to believe 
the tradition of the Indians, however, it had not this 
result ; for they say that formerly the waters teemed as 
thickly with turtles as the air now does with mosquitoes. 
The universal opinion of the settlers on the Upper 
