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the earth, and to every fowl of the air, and to every thing that creepeth upon the eaath, wherein there is life, I have given every green herb for meat; and it was fo." After the flood, when mankind began to repoffefs the earth, God gave Noah a much more extenfive permission: "Every moving thing that liveth fhall be meat for you; even as the green herb have I given you all things."

Saul's army, after a battle, flew, that is, fell voraciously upon the cattle they had taken, and threw them upon the ground to cut off their flefh, and eat them raw, fo that the army was defiled by eating blood, or living animals. To prevent this, Saul caufed to be rolled to him a great ftone, and ordered those that killed their oxen to cut their throats upon that ftone. This was the only lawful way of killing animals for food; the tying of the ox, and throwing it upon the ground was not permitted as equivalent. The Ifraelites did probably in that cafe, as the Abyffinians do at this day; they cut a part of its throat, fo that blood might be feen upon the ground, but nothing mortal to the animal followed from that wound. But, after laying his head upon a large ftone, and cutting his throat, the blood fell from on high, or was poured on the ground like water; and fufficient evidence appeared the creature was dead before it was attempted to eat it. We have feen that the Abyffinians came from Paleftine a very few years after this; and we are not to doubt that they then carried with them this, with many other Jewish cuftoms, which they have continued to this day.

Confiftent with the plan of this work, which is to defcribe the manners of the feveral nations through which Mr. Bruce paffed, good and bad, as he observed them, he fays he cannot avoid giving fomé account of this Polyphemus banquet, as far as decency will permit him; it is part of the hiftory of a barbarous people; and Mr. Bruce fays, however he might with it, he cannot decline it.

In the capital, where one is fafe from furprise at all times, or in the country or villages, when the rains have become fo conftant, that the valleys will not bear a horse to pass them, or that men cannot venture far from home, through fear of being furrounded and fwept away by temporary

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temporary torrents, occafioned by fudden fhowers on the mountains; in a word, when a man can fay he is safe at home, and the spear and fhield is hung up in the hall, a number of people of the best fashion in the villages, of both fexes, courtiers in the palace, or citizens in the town, meet together to dine between twelve and one o'clock. A long table is fet in the middle of a large room, and benches befide it for a number of guests who are invited. Tables and benches the Portuguese introduced amongst them; but bull-hides, fpread upon the ground, ferved them before, as they now do in the camp and country. A cow or bull, one or more, as the company is numerous, is brought clofe to the door, and his feet ftrongly tied. The fkin that hangs down under his chin and throat, is cut only fo deep as to arrive at the fat of which it totally confifts, and, by the feparation of a few small blood veffels, fix or feven drops of blood only fall upon the ground. They have no ftone, bench, nor altar, upon which thefe cruel affaffins lay the animal's head in this operation. Mr. Bruce begs his pardon indeed for calling him an affaffin, as he is not fo merciful as to aim at the life, but, on the contrary, to keep the beaft alive till he be nearly eaten up. Having fatisfied the Mofaical law, according to his conception, by pouring these fix or feven drops upon the ground, two or more of them fall to work; on the back of the beast, and on each fide of the fpine they cut fkin deep; then putting their fingers between the flesh and the fkin, they begin to ftrip the hide of the animal half way down his ribs, and fo on to the buttock, cutting the skin wherever it hinders them commodiously to ftrip the poor animal bare. All the flesh on the buttocks is then cut off, and in folid, fquare pieces, without bones, or much effufion of blood; and the prodigious noife the animal makes is a fignal for the company to fit down to table.

There are then laid before every gueft, instead of plates, round cakes, if they may be fo called, about twice as big as a pan-cake, and fomething thicker and tougher. It is unleavened bread of a fourish tafte, far from being difagreeable, and very eafily digested, made of a grain called teff. It is of different colours, from black to the colour of the whiteft wheat-bread. Three or four of L 3 thefe

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thefe cakes are generally put uppermoft, for the food of the perfon oppofite to whofe feat they are placed. Beneath these are four or five of ordinary bread, and of a blackifh kind. These serve the master to wipe his fingers upon, and afterwards the fervant for bread to his dinner. Two or three fervants then come, each with a fquare piece of beef in their bare hands, laying it upon the cakes of teff, placed like dishes down the table, without cloth or any thing elfe beneath them. By this time all the guests have knives in their hands, and their men have the large crooked ones, which they put to all forts of ufes during the time of war. The women have

fmall clafped knives, fuch as the worst of the kind made at Birmingham, fold for a penny each. The company are fo arranged that one man fits between two women; the man with his long knife cuts a thin piece, which would be thought a good beef-fteak in England, while you fee the motion of the fibres yet perfectly distinct, and alive in the flefl. No man in Abyffinia, of any fashion whatever, feeds himself, or touches his own meat. The women take the fteak and cut it length-ways like ftrings, about the thickness of a little finger, then crossways into fquare pieces, fomething fmaller than dice. This they lay upon a piece of the teff bread, ftrongly powdered with black pepper, or Cayenne pepper, and foffile falt; they then wrap it up in teff bread like a cartridge.

In the mean time, the man having put up his knife, with each hand refting upon his neighbour's knee, his body ftooping, his head low and forward, and mouth open very like an idiot, he turns to the one whofe cartridge is firft ready, who ftuffs the whole of it into his mouth, which is fo full that he is in conftant danger of being choaked. This is a mark of grandeur. The greater the man would feem to be, the larger piece he takes in his mouth; and the more noife he makes in chewing it, the more polite he is thought to be. They have, indeed, a proverb that fays, "Beggars and thieves only eat fmall pieces, or without making a noise.” Having difpatched this morfel, which he does very expeditioufly, his next female neighbour holds forth another catridge, which goes the fame way, and fo on till

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