CAVER, or CAVIARY, the spawn, or hard roes of sturgeon, made into small cakes, an inch thick, and of an hand's breadth, salted, and dried in the sun. This sort of food is in great repute throughout Muscovy, because of their three lents, which they keep with a superstitious exactness; wherefore the Italians settled at Moscow, drive a very great trade in this commodity throughout that empire, because there is a prodigious quantity of sturgeon taken at the mouth of the Wolga and of the other rivers which fall into the Caspian sea. There is a pretty large quantity of this commodity consumed in Italy, and they are very well acquainted with it in France and England, where it is reckoned no despicable dish.

The French and Italians get the cavear from Archangel, but they seldom get it at the first hand, for they commonly buy it of the English and Dutch.