Sacramento daily record-union. [volume] (Sacramento [Calif.]) 1875-1891, 1885-08-01
SALT As A DIET.
Some Interesting Facts About Its Use
and Disuse.

and Disuse.
No one will question that chloride of So
dunn (salt is capable of doing serious
| harm if taken in any but small quantities.
| 1t is a mineral substance, an antiseptic,
and. to some extent, a disinfectant, which
| indicates its antagonism to living things. A
larger dose than that to which person is
accustomed produces great thirst and other
discomforts. A still larger dose produces
great nausea and vomiting. The continued
use of large quantities produces one of the
most serious diseases due to dietic errors,
viz, scurvy. The popular belief that an
| appetite for salt is universal among lower
animals is without foundation in fact A
certain class only, and that a very small
! class when compared with all other classes
! of the animal kingdom, evinces any special
! fondneSs for salt. Dogs, cats and other
I carnivorous or hesh-eating animals, show
no fondness for salt. The same is true of
all classes of frugiyorous animals, of which
| the monkey is a representative, and in nat
ural habits and constitution the nearest
| approach to man to be found in the whole
animal world Even herbiverous animals
do not take salt daily with their food, as do
human beings, but only at intervals, per-
haps but few times a year, or at certain
| seasons only, which suggests the thought
! that probably they take 1t as medicine
rather than as food possibly as a vermi-
! fuge, as its occasional use is said to prevent
certain intestinal parasites to which these
animals are subject. That salt is not essen
! tial even to the health of herbiyerouS an
! finals is evinced by the fact that in certain
! parts of the wourld where salt is utterly
unknown as a natural product, antelope of
all kinds abound in countless numbers.
This is the case in Central Africa and in
! other parts of the world, and it is asserted
| by travellers in South Africa-even where
salt occurs in abundance naturally-the
| various classes of antelope show no fond
ness for it. We know of many instances
in which flocks of sheep and herds of cat
tie have been successfully reared without
, salt
1t is a well-known fact that in certain
parts of the world salt is even more scarce
than gold. In certain parts of Central
Africa to say that a certain man eats salt is
equivalent to saying that he is very rich.
Yet these people have existed for all ages,
and have enjoyed the very best of barbar-
Gus health without a taste of salt from in
fancy to old age We have also been in
formed on creditable authority that in Sibe-
Tia salt is not in use as a common COnstit-
uent of food and the same was true of
numerous North American Indian tribes
at the time of the discovery of this CONT
still true of the Pampas Indians of South
America. In ancient as well as modern
times there were non-salt-eating people
as we learn from Homer, who, in the
| Odyssey, refers to nation who ate no
salt. We are confident that chloride of
sodium was never intended to be eaten
as an article of diet. On theoretical
grounds, ii would be just as reasonable to
add to our food quantities of phosphate of
lime powdered chalk, silica, magnesia,
chloride of potash and other salts which
are found in the body, as to add to it COM
mon salt. Indeed, the elements mentioned,
! or the most of them at least, are found in
| the body in much larger quantities than is
common salt. II is not questioned that in
an organized form, that in which it occurs
| in almost all our foods, salt is useful in the
body but it is certainly reasonable to sup
| pose that the same wise Creator who knew
| Just how much of phosphatcs and carbon
| ates and other elements to put into our
| food should also have known precisely
| how much chloride of sodium was best for
us, and that the admixture of this one
necessary ingredient was not left for the
| hap-hazard and uncertain judgment Of
man.-[S Science Monthly.