HOUSES AND FOOD. 221 the pigs reared on the island. On each side of the chimney there are often benches with coops under¬ neath for poultry, which, from the warmth of the dwelling, lay eggs all winter. The usual diet of the people is made up of biscuit, potatoes and fish, salt pork, and bohea tea. Spruce beer is a very common and excellent beverage, parti¬ cularly for people who live so much on fish and salt meat. The process of making it is simple. A few black spruce branches are chopped into small pieces, and put into a pot containing six or eight gallons of water, and then boiled for several hours. The liquor is then strained, and put into a cask that will contain eighteen gallons. Molasses is added in the propor¬ tion of one gallon to eighteen ; a part of the grounds of the last brewing, and a few hops, if at hand, are also put in ; and the cask, filled up with cold water, is left to ferment, and in twenty-four hours, becomes fit for use. Spirits are frequently mixed with spruce beer, to make the drink "named Callibogus. From the cheapness of rum, the labouring people, though by no means generally, acquire habits of excessive drinking, which they have only resolution to resist by swearing, by the Cross or the Gospel, that they will not taste rum, or spirits of any kind. This act is called Kegging, extending to one or more years, and often for life. The inhabitants are generally very healthy ; but, from living so much on fish and other oily food, fevers or small-pox, when imported into the island from other