asked, if his countrymen eat the part thus cut out? denied it
strongly, but, upon the question being repeated, shewed some degree of
fear, and swam to his canoe. Just before he reached it, he made signs,
as he had done before, expressive of the use of the instrument. And an
old man, who sat foremost in the canoe, being then asked whether they
eat the flesh? answered in the affirmative, and laughed, seemingly
at the simplicity of such a question. He affirmed the fact, on being
asked again; and also said, it was excellent food, or, as he expressed
it, "savoury eating."[3]

[Footnote 3: Of this there can be no doubt, if the assertions of those
who have tried it be entitled to credit. When the reluctance, then, to
use it is once overcome, there is no reason to think it would ever be
abandoned, if it could be safely and conveniently procured. We have
instances of this on record. Some persons necessitated, let us allow,
to have recourse to it, have continued the practice, where the doing
so required the repeated commission of murder. We formerly alluded to
instances of this kind, and we see in the case of the people before
us, that hunger is not the only motive for so abominable a repast.
Admitting even that it were the original one, we should expect the
practice to be relinquished whenever other food was to be had in
sufficient quantity. But this we know by many proofs is not the case;
and perhaps, indeed, it will be found, that this odium is fully as
prevalent in savage countries, where nature has been bountiful, as
in those where a more stinted hand has inflicted poverty on the
inhabitants. The causes, then, and the remedies of this most shocking
enormity, are to be looked for in other circumstances than the
scarcity or the profusion of food. Here we may be allowed to join in
opinion with Dr Robertson. "Human flesh was never used as common
food in any country, and the various relations concerning people
who reckoned it among the stated means of subsistence, flow from the
credulity and mistakes of travellers. The rancour of revenge first
prompted men to this barbarous action." In addition to his opinion and
that of the authors quoted by him, in his History of America, lib. 4,
the reader may advantageously consult Dr Forster's Observations. If
the sentiments maintained by these writers be correct, we may expect
to find cannibalism in almost every country where the spirit of
revenge is not curbed by principle, or directed by