“alexander died. alexander was buried. alexander returneth into dust; the dust is earth: of earth we make loam. and why of that loam, whereto he was converted, might they not stop a beer barrel?”——hamlet.
the fact, at one time doubted, but now established beyond dispute, that some tribes indulge in the habit of dirt-eating, is one which, from its singularity, claims notice. the malayan uses lime as an ingredient in compounding his favourite masticatory, and the coquero of the andes mixes it with his leaves of coca. the nubians mingle the saline natron with their quid of tobacco, and the blacks of gesira the same material to compound their “bucca.” the ottamacs and omaguas avail themselves of the assistance of shell lime to give pungency to their intoxicating snuffs. the tribes on the coast of paria, according to gomara, stimulated the organs of taste by caustic lime, as other races employ tobacco, coca, or betel. in our own days this practice exists among the guajiros at the mouth of the rio de la hacha. here the still uncivilized indians carry small shells, calcined and powdered, in a box made from the husk of a fruit. this box is suspended from their girdle, and serves305 a variety of purposes. the powder used by the guajiros is an article of commerce, as formerly was that of the indians of paria. what could first have induced these people to use by itself, or other races to mingle with vegetable substances, a mineral only known to us as a whitewash, or for somewhat similar vulgar uses, and to metamorphose it into a luxury, is difficult to understand. we comprehend the value of lime when stirred about in a pail, with sufficiency of water to reduce it to the consistence of cream, and then by the aid of a broad flat brush transferred to the ceilings of our dwellings. we cannot so well comprehend or appreciate the luxury of rolling it into a pellet, and transferring it to our mouths, as a whitewash for regions where the curious eye of man does not penetrate.
river scene
the residents at the fur-posts on the mackenzie river, have a mineral in use among them, known by the appellation of white mud, which is used for whitewashing, and, when soap is scarce, it supplies the place of that article for washing clothes. it resembles pipe-clay, and exists in beds from six to twelve inches in thickness. it is of a yellowish white colour, sometimes with a reddish tinge. on the arkansas also a similar substance has been met with, called pink clay. the clay of the mackenzie is smooth, and, when masticated, has a flavour, we are told, resembling the kernel of a hazel nut. sir john richardson obtained some of this clay in his journey to prince rupert’s land, and had it examined, but could not discover in it any nutritious properties, or detect the remains of infusorial animalcul?, such as are found in other edible clays. the natives of the locality in which this substance is found, eat it in times of scarcity, and suppose that by its use they prolong their lives. there are certain306 physiological reasons known to us whereby we account for fowls, and other winged bipeds indulging in the singular propensity of swallowing small pebbles, fragments of lime or mortar, sand and clay; but as we cannot apply these same arguments to the cases of other “bipeds without feathers” who indulge in the same propensity, we naturally seek for some signs of nutritious value in the substance itself. in this instance the remote probability of its containing decayed animal matter does not apparently exist, for the microscope detects no infusoria. and unless we argue, as did hamlet with his friend horatio, that in this clay are the remains of a previous generation, we can scarce account for its being a good article of food.
“imperial c?sar, dead and turned to clay,
might stop a hole to keep the wind away;”
or dead indians turned to clay to appease the hunger of their living descendants. thus, if the imagination may trace the noble dust of alexander, till we find it stopping a bunghole, may it not also follow this same clay from the bunghole into the veins of a new alexander?
richardson states that the above is a kind of pipe-clay. if made into pipes for smoking, hamlet might argue still further, “may we not trace the dust of the dead indian, till we find a man smoking his weed from the leg or arm of his great grandfather.”
clay eating exists in south america, among the guamos, and by the tribes between the meta and the apure. the natives here speak of the custom as one of great antiquity. the ottomacs are, however, great clay-eaters. humboldt found amongst them heaps of earth-balls, piled up in pyramid three or four feet high, and these balls307 five or six inches in diameter. this clay was of a yellowish grey colour, and did not contain magnesia, but silex and alumina, and three or four per cent. of lime, no trace of organic substance, either oily or farinaceous, could be found mixed with it. if the ottomac is asked what he lives upon during the two months of the inundation of the rivers, he shows you his balls of clayey earth. it is asserted that far from becoming lean at that season, they are, on the contrary, extremely robust.
at the village of banco, on the rio magdalena, the same traveller found indian women making pottery, who continually swallowed great pieces of clay.
on the coast of guinea, the negroes eat a yellowish earth, which they call caouac, the taste of which is said to be agreeable, and to cause no inconvenience. when these africans are carried to the west indies, they still indulge in the custom, for which purpose chanvalon states that it is sold in the markets, but that the west-indian clay does not agree with them so well as that of their native country.
labillardière saw between surabaya and samarang little square reddish cakes, called tanaampo, exposed for sale, which were slightly baked, and eaten with relish.
leschenault states that the reddish clay (ampo) which the javanese are fond of eating occasionally, is spread on a plate of iron and baked, after being rolled into little cylinders in the form of cinnamon bark. in this state it is sold in the markets. it has a peculiar taste, which is owing to the baking, is very absorbent, and adheres to the tongue. the javanese women eat the ampo in order to grow thin, the absence of plumpness being there regarded as a kind of beauty.
in times of hunger or scarcity, the savages of308 new caledonia eat great pieces of a friable stone, which contains magnesia and silex, with a little oxide of copper.
the african negroes of bunck and los idoles eat a kind of white and friable steatite, or soapstone, from which custom they are said to suffer no inconvenience.
at popayan and several of the mountainous parts of peru, finely-powdered lime is sold in the public markets with other articles of food. this powder is, however, generally mixed with the leaves of the coca, and used as a masticatory. in other parts of south america, lime is swallowed alone, the indians carrying with them a little box of lime, as other people carry their tobacco-box, snuff-box, or siri-box.
in the kingdom of quito, the tigua natives eat from choice, and without any ill consequences, a very fine clay mixed with sand. this clay, mixed with water, renders it milky. large vessels filled with this mixture, called agua de llanka, water of clay, or leche de llanka, milk of clay, may be seen in most of their huts, where it serves as a beverage.
on the banks of the river kamen-da-maslo, there is produced a fossil, or an earthy substance, called in russian kamennoye maslo, stone butter, which is eaten in various ways, as well by the russians as the tongousi, it is of a yellowish cream colour, and not unpleasant in taste, but it is forbidden as pernicious in its effects. this earthy matter is stated to be a fossil, or salt oozing out of rocks, in many parts of siberia, but chiefly from those near the river irtish and yenissei. when it is exposed to the air in dry weather it hardens, but in wet weather it again becomes soft or liquid. the russian hunters use it also as a bait. the animals scent it from afar, and are fond of the smell.
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in germany, the workmen employed in the quarries of sandstone at kiffhauser, spread a fine clay upon their bread instead of butter, which they call steinbutter (stone butter). there is another substance, called bergbutter, or mountain butter, which is a saline substance produced by the decomposition of aluminous schists.
on the shores of a lake near urania, in sweden, is found a deposit, called by the peasants “mountain meal” (bergmehl) which they use, mixed up with flour, as an article of food. this deposit consists chiefly of fossil infusoria.
in finland also, a similar kind of earth is mixed with bread stuff, as also in parts of northern germany in cases of scarcity or necessity. in lapland also, this fossil farina has been found, and applied to a like use. the tripoli or rotten stone of commerce is an infusorial earth of this description, composed of fossils of extraordinary minute dimensions.
a poor man, in the neighbourhood of dejufors, sweden, some years since, found an earth of this description, which had much the appearance of meal. the people being at that time in a state of privation, and living upon bark bread, this man took some home, mixed it with rye meal, baked it into bread, and found it palatable, hereupon there was a general run upon this earth, and some of it found its way to stockholm. on analysis it was found to contain flint and feldspar, finely pulverized with lime, clay, oxide of iron, and some organic substance resembling animal matter, and yielding ammonia, and an oil.
ehrenberg found that a hill in bohemia was one mass of the siliceous fossil shells of these minute creatures, and that in a stratum fourteen feet in thickness, one cubic inch contained the remains of 41,000,000,000 of individuals.
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these kind of deposits are continually accumulating, and producing important changes, in the bed of the nile, at dongola, and in the elbe, at cuxhaven, and even choking up some of the harbours in the baltic sea.
dr. trail analyzed a bergmehl from the north of sweden, and found it to be composed of the minute shields of infusoria, about one thousandth of an inch in size, consisting chiefly of siliceous earth and alumina. a small quantity of this curious substance was found in county down, ireland, by dr. drummond, twenty years ago, while sinking a pit near newcastle.
mm. cloquet and breschet ate experimentally as much as five ounces of a silvery green laminar talc. their hunger was completely satisfied, and they felt no inconvenience from the use of a kind of food to which they had not been accustomed. in parts of the east, use is still made of the bole earths of lemnos, which are clay mixed with oxide of iron.
in portugal and spain, bucaro clays are made into vessels, from which many are fond of drinking on account of the smell of the clay; and the women of the province of alentejo acquire a habit of masticating the bucaro earth, and feel it a great privation when unable to indulge in this vitiated taste.
in the bolivian markets, dr. weddell saw a grey-coloured clay which was offered for sale. it is called pahsa, and the indians of la paz eat it with the bitter potato of the country. it is steeped in water, made into a kind of gruel, and seasoned with salt.
at chiquisaca a kind of earth called chaco is made into little pots, and eaten like chocolate. although their moderate use is not calculated to injure the system, their contribution to the nourishment of the body must be but small.
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in the valleys of the sikkim himalayas, a kind of red earth is chewed as a cure for the go?tre, but it is not stated to be regularly indulged in as an article of food either there or in any other part of india.
mr. wallace relates that a little indian boy died from the habit of dirt-eating—a very common and destructive habit among indians and half breeds in the houses of the whites in the amazon valley. all means had been tried to cure the lad of the habit. he had been physicked and whipped, and confined in doors; but when no other opportunity offered, he would find a plentiful supply in the mud walls of the house. the whole body, face, and limbs swelled, so that he could with difficulty walk, and not having so much care taken of him, he ate his fill and died.
those who have had much to do with children, will have noticed amongst some of them the germs of this propensity, which will occasionally develop itself in chewing pieces of pipe, slate pencil, chalk, and other substances of a like nature. although not carried to so great an extent as to become injurious, cases of this kind are far from being, among school children, either exceptional or uncommon.
in the mission of san borja, humboldt found the child of an indian woman, which, according to the statement of its mother, would hardly eat anything but earth. it was very thin and emaciated.
these instances are not, after all, so singular as those of habitual, national dirt-eating which we find amongst the tribes of south america and the negroes of africa. children are not always the most particular in the choice of their articles of food, or we should not read of such instances as occur in tropical america of these youngsters drawing immense centipedes out of their holes and eating them; or, as related by captain312 cochrane, of a child devouring several pieces of tallow candle, which was succeeded by a large lump of yellow soap, all of which he seemed to enjoy.
chroniclers often make mention of the employment, during times of war, of kinds of infusorial earth as food, under the general term of mountain meal. this was the case in the thirty years war, at camin in pomerania, muskau in the lausitz, and kleiken in the dessau territory; and subsequently in 1719 and 1733 at the fortress of wittenberg. but in times of war and scarcity, one is prepared to hear of men satisfying their hunger by every legitimate means.
m.?s. julien sent to the academy of sciences at paris some few years since, specimens of a peculiar mineral substance from the province of kiang-si in china, on which, in times of famine, the inhabitants have been said to be able to support themselves as a nutriment. it has a disagreeable taste, and produces dryness in the mouth. it is nevertheless used by the natives mixed with flour, and is even esteemed by them.
it may appear somewhat singular to refer to these dirt-eating customs, in connection with those relating to narcotics. the connection is, however, more intimate than at the first glance might appear. two kinds of substances are mostly resorted to, either to gratify these depraved tastes, or satisfy the cravings of hunger—lime and clay, or, as we have designated them—clay and whitewash. it is, or has been matter of dispute, whether the stimulating properties of the betel and coca, and the intoxicating snuffs of the orinoco, are to be attributed to the vegetable substances themselves, or to the lime used with them, or both in conjunction; hence the introduction of lime is not considered inappropriate. as for the clay, it is not313 only intimately associated with the other, from the similarity of the use to which it is thus strangely applied, but the connection of it in some of its forms with the consumption of one or two of the narcotics, as the means whereby they are indulged in, must serve as an apology, if such be needed.
