“As the people of all these islands are destitute of iron, it is wonderful to see their tools, which are of stone, very sharp and admirably made, such as axes, adzes, and other instruments, which they use in constructing their dwellings. Their food is bread, made from roots, which God has given them instead of wheat; for they have neither wheat nor rye, nor barley, nor oats, nor spelt-wheat, nor panic-grass, nor anything resembling them. No kind of food that the Castilians had as yet tasted was like anything that we have here. There were no beans, nor chick-peas, nor vetches, nor lentils, nor lupines, nor any quadruped or animal, excepting some small dogs, and the others, which look like large rats, or something between a large rat and a rabbit, and are very good and savoury for eating, and have feet and paws like rats, and climb trees. The dogs are of all colours,--white, black, etc. There are lizards and snakes, but not many, for the Indians eat them, and think them as great a dainty as partridges are to the Castilians. The lizards are like ours in size, but different in shape, though, in a little island near the harbour called San Juan, where the squadron remained several days, a lizard was several times seen, as large round as a young calf, and as smooth as a lance; and several times they attempted to kill it, but could not, on account of the thickness of the trees, and it fled into the sea. Besides eating lizards and snakes, these Indians devour all the spiders and worms that they find, so that their beastliness appears to exceed that of any beast.” Modern investigation has thrown much light on the physical characteristics of the native inhabitants of the Lucayan or Bahama islands. Some years ago Ecker and Wyman studied the subject, and more recently Prof. W. K. Brooks has visited the islands and presented a memoir to the National Academy of Sciences on the peculiarities of the bones discovered in the course of his investigations. It is clearly established that the natives belonged to a large and well-developed race. Ecker found bones which he thought must have belonged to a race of giants. But Professor Brooks is of the opinion that they “did not depart essentially from the Spanish average.” His measurements showed that “The skulls are large, and about equal in size to the average modern civilized white skull.”