The articles of their food have been enumerated already; the principal, which to them is what bread is to the inhabitants of Europe, is the roots of the fern which grows upon the hills, and is nearly the same with what grows upon our high commons in England, and is called indifferently fern, bracken, or brakes. The birds which sometimes serve them for a feast, are chiefly penguins and albatrosses, with a few other species that have been occasionally mentioned in this narrative.

Having no vessel in which water can be boiled, their cookery consists wholly of baking and roasting. They bake nearly in the same manner as the inhabitants of the South Seas, and to the account that has been already given of their roasting, nothing need be added, but that the long skewer or spit to which the flesh is fastened, is placed sloping towards the fire, by setting one stone against the bottom of it, and supporting it near the middle with another, by the moving of which to a greater or less distance from the end, the degree of obliquity is increased or diminished at pleasure.

Voyaging Accounts