A New Voyage Round the World by a Course Never Sailed BeforeDefoe, Daniel
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A New Voyage Round the World by a Course Never Sailed Before
Defoe, Daniel
Adventure stories; Voyages around the world -- Fiction
The people where we were now were not so rich in gold as those where we
were before, but we found them much better stored with provisions; for
besides deer, of which they had great plenty and variety, for they had
some of a sort which I had never seen before, and besides an infinite
number of those rabbits I have mentioned, which were as big as our
hares, and which do not burrow in the ground as our rabbits do, they had
also a kind of sheep, large, (like those of Peru, where they are used to
carry burdens), and very good. They have no wool nor horns, but are
rather hairy like a goat; nor should I call them sheep, but that their
flesh eats like mutton, and I knew not what else to call them. The
natives called them huttash; but what breed, or from what part of the
world, or whether peculiar to this division alone, I know not.
However, their flesh was very agreeable, and they were fat and good; and
as the Indians were mightily pleased with the price we paid them, and
the goods we paid them in, they brought us more of these huttashes than
we knew what to do with; and as I can calculate the rate, I suppose we
might have them for about eight-pence, or sometimes not above sixpence
cost each; for they would give us one very thankfully for a string or
two of small beads, and think themselves mighty well paid.
I found them so plentiful, and so easy to come at, that in short I sent
fifty of them alive, tied neck and heels, in one of the shallops back to
our ships, and ordered them to send their long-boats over for more; for
though it was so little a way over, we did not find they had any of them
on that side the river.
We did the Indians another piece of service, for, if they gave us meat,
we taught them to be cooks, for we showed them how to roast it upon a
stick or spit before the fire; whereas they ate all their meat before,
either stewed in earthen pots over the fire, with herbs, such as we did
not understand, or thrown on burning fuel of green wood, which always
made it taste and stink of the smoke most intolerably.
We had a great deal of opportunity now to converse with the people on
both sides the river; and we found them to be not only different
nations, but of different speech and different customs. These on the
south side, where I now was, seemed to be the best furnished with
provisions, and to live in the greatest plenty. But those on the north
side appeared better clothed, and a more civilized sort of people; and
of the two, seemed to have in their countenances something more
agreeable.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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