Page:Voyage in search of La Perouse, volume 2 (Stockdale).djvu/305

] Fig. 10.), but much better carved than the figures we had seen in other places at the entrance into their houses. He covered his face with it several times, peeping through the holes made in the upper part of it. There was an opening for the mouth, but there were none for the eyes. They probably make use of those masks to prevent being known by their enemies when they undertake any hostile enterprize.

We then advanced towards two fires lighted close by the huts, where we found a man and woman dressing figs of a new species, which they had placed upon the fire in a great earthen pot, without water, to take away the corrosive quality. They called those figs ouyou.

I remarked two children at the fire, regaling themselves with spiders of a new species, which I had observed frequently in the woods, where they spread their webs of such strength, as frequently to incommode us very much in our progress. They first killed them, covering them up in a great earthen vessel, which they heated on a brisk fire. They then broiled and eat them. They swallowed at least one hundred of them in our presence. We saw afterwards in the same island several other inhabitants eagerly seeking the same kind of food.

Such an extravagant and yet so general a taste