rule in this feast that every mouthful should be swallowed
by each guest, however unwilling and unable he
should be to do so, but he who could dispose of it with
greatest speed was deemed the greatest man--at least
on that occasion--while the last to conclude his supper
was looked upon with some degree of contempt!
It seems strange that such a custom should ever have
arisen, and one is not a little puzzled in endeavouring
to guess at the origin of it. There is one fact that
occurs to us as the probable cause. The Indian is, as