The Abbeville press and banner. [volume] (Abbeville, S.C.) 1869-1924, 1877-09-05
CURIOSITIES OF FOOD.
some Things OF Interest to Epicures of High
and Low Degree.


dating himself to a varied diet. All birds,
insects and animals, with but few excep-
tions, are used as food by the different
races on the globe, although such as are
esteemed delicacy by some are refused
as unfit and disgusting by others. The
main deductions from the diversity of
diet, aside from the curiosities of taste
thus presented, are that the same life
sustaining elements abound in all these
manifold varieties of food.
Cannibalism, though now confined
principally to the Polynesian Islands,
was practiced by the ancient inhabitants
of Britain, and even by other European
countries, many years ago. The eating
of horse flesh originated in TRtary, was
introduced into Norway into 1910, and
it's Use now prevails in fifteen European
States besides France. Ancient Romans
liked the flesh of the wild ass, the fox
and the bear, and now we find Arabs eat
ing camels; the Australians kangaroos;
the East Indians, zebras, wolves, iackals
and leopards; while the inhabitants of
Abyssinia and Sumatra feast on elephant
and hippopotamus meat.
Frogs ore now eaten the world over;
snails are used as food in many parts of
Europe; sharks are relished by the Gold
coast natives and New Zealanders;
crocodiles are esteemed q luxury by the
natives of Africa and Australia; slugs
are in common use in China; walrus and
seal grace the dining-halls of the Esqui-
maux, and whales adorn the fsh markets
of Japan.
Of the animals of smaller size the dog
seems to be favorite eating in China,
New Zealand, South Sea islands, Aus
traia and parts of Africa. Pliny tells
us that even Roman gourmands regarded
puppies as great deicacy. During the
late siege in Paris dog flesh sold as high
as sixty cents per pound. OF all nations
the Chinese seem the least fastidious and
have no preiudices not easily overcome,
if they can only command plentiful sup
ply of dogs, cats, rats, mice, monkies,
Monkies are held in high esteem as food
by the natives of Ceylon, Trinidad, Bor-
neo, Spanish Guiana, and on the ANA
zon; hedgehog is princely dish in Bar
barry and is also eaten in Spain; the
Hudson bay skunk is eaten by the In
dians there, and squirrels by the Ameri-
can Indians.
African natives eat ants stewed in
palm oil, while the large white ants are
roasted in pots and eaten by handfuls as
we eat sugar plums. As to locusts (such
unwelcome guests in America, they look
upon them as blessing, equal to our
estimate of bread and butter; they
smoke and salt them, boil or stew, grind
them down as corn, and their use is very
fattening. The Bedouins of Mesopo-
tamia and other Eastern people dry and
string locusts together to eat on their
journeyings with unleavened bread; they
are also enjoyed by the Persians, Egyp-
tians, Arabians, Bushmen, who claim for
them strong vegetable taste favored
by the plants upon which they feed.
Caterpillars were eaten by the ancients
at their feasts; and the same happy GUS
tom is perpetrated by the natives of
South Africa. Spiders, beetles and
grasshoppers are included in the bills of
fare of African Bushmen and the inhabi-
tants of New Caledonia, to which the
former add, by way of side. dishes, roots
and bulbs. the larvae of ants, lizards and
locusts. In India, Zanzibar, java, China
and South Australia the use of snakes,
lizards and bats, as articles of food, is
quite common.
A strange custom exists in many parts
of the world of eating earth, proba-
bly, having its origin in certain To-
calities where the earth so used for food
was found to consist in part OF the re-
mains of minute animals and organisms.
Certain tribes live principally during
the rainy seasons upon fat, unctuous
clay; and the same is eaten by Japanese
bellies, after being made into thin cakes,
to give them slenderness of form. A
kind of earth known as bread-meal is
largely used in northern Europe, and
similar substance called mountain-meal
has. in times of famine, stayed hunger in
northern Germany. Much of the clay
so commonly used in warm countries,
and also by certain classes in the South,
is mere liet, has no alimentary value,
and its use leads to certain disease and
sure death.
Civilization, agricultural and COM
merce elevates the customs and appetites
of the nations of the earth, by broaden
ing their fields for supply, and giving
chancellor comparison of the worlds diet
ary systems. What was once con-
sumed as a necessity is no longer palata-
BILE to the people whose opportunities
are broadened and whose tastes are re-
fined WoOnsocket Patriot.