Note 356 — Chapter X · FOOD OF THE NAHUA NATIONS.

'Crian muchas gallinas ... que son tan grandes como pavos.' 'Conejos, liebres, venados y perros pequeños, que crian para comer castrados.' Cortés, Cartas, pp. 23, 94, 104, 222. 'Young whelpes flesh is vsuall there ... which they geld and fatte for foode.' Peter Martyr, dec. v., lib. iii. The same author, dec. v., lib. iii., gives some queer information respecting the turkeys. 'The femalles sometimes lay 20. or 30. egges, so that it is a multiplying company. The males, are alwayes in loue, and therefore they say, they are very light meate of digestion.' A certain priest reports that 'the male is troubled with certayne impedimentes in the legges, that he can scarse allure the henne to treade her, vnlesse some knowne person take her in his hand, and hold her.... As soone as hee perceiueth the henne which he loueth, is held, hee presently commeth vnto her, and performes his businesse in the hand of the holder,' See Clavigero, Storia Ant. del Messico, tom. ii., pp. 158-9, tom. iv., p. 228; Carbajal Espinosa, Hist. Mex., tom. i., pp. 624-6; Oviedo, Hist. Gen., tom. iii., pp. 291-2.