Page:Voyage in search of La Perouse, volume 2 (Stockdale).djvu/275

] ner, by imitating it on one of the ship's company, who, at his desire, lay down on his back. The savage first represented a combat, in which he indicated by signs that the enemy fell under the strokes of his javelin and club, which he brandished with great violence. He then performed a sort of warlike dance, holding in his hand the instrument of murder; he then shewed us that they begin by opening the belly with the nbouet, throwing away the intestines, after having torn them out with an instrument (represented in Plate XXXVIII. Fig. 20), made of two human cubitus, well polished, and fixed to a very strong tape. He shewed us they next cut off the parts of generation, which fell to the share of the conqueror. The legs and arms are cut off at the joints, and distributed, as well as the other parts, amongst the combatants to carry home to their families. It is difficult to describe the ferocious avidity with which he represented to us the manner in which the flesh of the unfortunate victim is devoured by them, after being broiled on a fire of charcoal.

The same cannibal gave us likewise to understand that the flesh of the arms and legs is cut into pieces about three inches thick, and that the muscular parts are reckoned by these people