beasts touched it.

Mugambi built a fire and cooked his portion of the kill; but Tarzan,
Sheeta, and Akut tore theirs, raw, with their sharp teeth, growling
among themselves when one ventured to encroach upon the share of
another.

It was not, after all, strange that the white man's ways should
have been so much more nearly related to those of the beasts than
were the savage blacks. We are, all of us, creatures of habit,
and when the seeming necessity for schooling ourselves in new ways
ceases to exist, we fall naturally and easily into the manners and
customs which long usage has implanted ineradicably within us.

Mugambi from childhood had eaten no meat until it had been cooked,
while Tarzan, on the other hand, had never tasted cooked food of
any sort until he had grown almost to manhood, and only within the
past three or four years had he eaten cooked meat. Not only did
the habit of a lifetime prompt him to eat it raw, but the craving
of his palate as well; for to him cooked flesh was spoiled flesh
when compared with the rich and juicy meat of a fresh, hot kill.

That he could, with relish, eat raw meat that had been buried by
himself weeks before, and enjoy small rodents and disgusting grubs,
seems to us who have been always "civilized" a revolting fact; but
had we learned in childhood to eat these things, and had we seen
all those about us eat them, they would seem no more sickening to
us now than do many of our greatest dainties, at which a savage
African cannibal would look with repugnance and turn up his nose.