Relation 
Honey. 
Cattle. 
64 
[1671 
are shap’d like plums, & like them in taste; and many 
other kinds. 
There’s a quantity of Honey Bees in the said Island. 
Honey also abounds there; it serves them for making 
wine of Honey, which is like the Hydromel which is 
made in France; ’tis the ordinary drink of the country. 
There are several localities where Honey is not so common 
as in others ; in default of it they plant quantities of sugar 
canes,from which they press the juice, which serves for drink. 
There’s a large number of cattle in the said Island, & 
particularly of oxen and cows, which all have a hump 
between the two shoulders. There are some of these 
humps which weigh more than sixty pounds, ’tis only of 
fat, which they melt, & the fat serves for butter to do what 
one wishes with it. These beasts are well made, & have 
the legs very slender. There are some which have not 
horns, & others which have them only attach’d by the 
skin: they call them Bourys ; these Bourys, not having 
horns to defend themselves with, bite like dogs. 
The flesh of these beasts is as well tasted as those of 
Europe : in all the Oriental countries there’s not as good 
meat as in the Island of Madagascar. 
The Cows are different to those in Europe; for they 
have no milk but when they have Calves, thus they make 
very little butter in the said Island. 
I insert here something of an expedition made by 
Monsieur de Champmargou in the year 1668 to the 
residence of one nam’d Rahessaf, Chief of a Province 
neighbouring to that of Hayfouchy of which I have 
spoken, from what I have said of Hayfouchy one can 
judge of the quantity of beasts which there’s in the 
Island. 
In the year 1668, the French Residents in the Island 
being short of provisions & cattle, they sought means to 
remedy this ; so ’twas resolv’d that war should be made 
