From a passage in Pliny (lib. viii., c. 44), it would appear, that the Onager inhabited Africa; and that the most delicate and best flavoured lalisiones, or fat foals, were brought from that continent to the Roman markets. Leo Africanus repeats the same story of wild asses being found in Africa, but no traveller has since met with them; and, as far as we at present know, the species is confined to Asia.
The quaggas (Asinus Quagga) are often hunted in Africa by the Dutch for their skins, of which they make large bags to hold their grain, and by the Hottentots and other natives, who are very fond of their flesh.
Lieutenant Moodie (Ten Years in South Africa) says, ‘Being one morning at the house of a neighbouring farmer who had just shot one of these animals, I requested that he would have a piece of the flesh cooked for my breakfast. His ‘frow’ expressed some disgust at my proposal, but ordered a small bit to be grilled, with butter and pepper. I did not find it at all unpalatable, and certainly it was better than horse-flesh, to which I had been treated in the hospital at Bergen-op-Zoom in 1814, when lying wounded there, after the unfortunate failure of that well-planned attack.’
RUMINANTIA.
The ruminants furnish, as is well known, the largest portion of our animal food, being consumed by man alike in civilized or unsettled countries. The domestic animals require little notice at our hands. There are, however, some whose flesh is eaten in different countries that are less familiar. Thus the bison and musk-ox of North America, the reindeer of Greenland and Northern Europe—the various antelopes, the gnu, the giraffe, and the camel of Africa, and the alpaca tribe of South America, supply much of the animal food of the people in the districts where they are common.
The flesh of the camel is dry and hard, but not unpalatable. Heliogabalus had camels’ flesh and camels’ feet served up at his banquets. In Barbary, the tongues are salted and smoked for exportation to Italy and other countries, and they form a very good dish. The flesh is little esteemed by the Tartars, but they use the hump cut into slices, which, dissolved in tea, serves the purpose of butter.
The flesh of the Axis deer (Cervus axis, or Axis maculata) is not much esteemed in Ceylon, having little fat upon it, and being very dry. The India samver, or musk deer, is eaten there.
The flesh of the great moose deer or elk, of North America, the carcase of which weighs 1,000 or 1,200 lbs., is as valuable for food as beef, but from its immense size, much of the flesh is usually left in the forest.
It is more relished by the Indians and persons resident in the fur countries, than that of any other animal, and bears a greater resemblance in its flavour to beef than to venison. It is said that the external fat is soft like that of a breast of mutton, and when put into a bladder is as fine as marrow.