The Opelousas courier., 1890-02-15
OILS FROM MANY LANDS
rEyr ouEER COLLECTION OF A
WASHINGTON DRUGGIST.
Oils Made From Cod L1vers Cfoco-
diIes, Whales, Reptiles, Birds ana
Rugs-Their Uses.

BU3S-A1ACA O5CS.
A leading Washington Cd. CO. drug
| pist. in a talk with a Star reporter, SAID:
GAN medical men agree that cod liver
| oil is a wonderful strengthened; 1t acts
in some mysterious way upon tne nu-
tritive processes, so far as to cause Inc
formation of healthy tissue and increases
the size of " red corpuscles in the
blood. I have heard that the only sure
cure for consumption is for the patient to
90 and live in the Arctic regions with
the Eskimo and feed almost exclusively
| on blubber in long strips; so long as ne
is willing to maintain this regimen the
disease doesn't have a show. Presuma-
| b]y cod liver oil works in somewhat the
same way as blubber. The only trouble
is that. whereas you can eat unlimited
blubber, if you are hungry enough ana
there is nothing else, you cannot prohta-
bly consume more than three tablespoon
fuls a day of cod liver oil, inasmuch as 1t
will not be assimilated. But those three
tablespoonfuls do an astonishing amount
of good. IL is often given externally by
rubbing it into the patients skin, which
absorbs It,"
"Where does the oil come from?"
"The Goldfish that supply the livers are
mostly caught off the North Atlantic
coast by means of travis, which are lines
miles in length with anchors at the ends,
floats at intervals to hold them up and
hooks all along at intervals of six feet,
baited twice a day, when the game that
catches itself is taken off. The shallow
banks far out at sea are the chief fishing
grounds, small boats being used to tend
the travis. When a vessel has a
load of cod it puts into Glou-
cester, Boston or some other convenient
port. The fish it has caught have all
been split, cleaned and dried in the sun
at sea, if the trip has been a long one, for
they would not keep otherwise, and the
livers have been thrown into barrels on
deck to purify. Fishermen don't mind
bad smells. The processes of decompo-
sition liberate some of the oil, which
rises to the tops of the barrels and is
skinned off, to be subsequently sold as
a fair article. Upon reaching land the
residue is disposed of to the manufac-
turers who boil the mess with water,
| strain it, draw off the oil from the top
of the water, strain it again and put it
up in that shape for market. But this
oil made from ~decomposed livers is not
the superine stuff you see in those bot
ties on the shelf. The first quality oil,
| for medicinal purposes, must be made
from fresh livers, brought by boats that
bring in fresh fish caught on short voy-
ages. The fresh ~livers, upon the value
percentage of their gains, are boiled
with water, her put into canvas bags
and pressed in hydraulic machines, until
ttS pure oil is all forced out through
the fabric of the bags, leaving inside the
bags a tallow-like mass of stearin and
liver refuse, which is sold to the soap
makers. The Oil thus separated is then
ready for bottling. The very best cod
liver oil of all, however, is only made in
the winter; the cooked livers are frozen
solid and put in CONCEALED masses into
! the bags, which are then submitted to
pressure as in the other case."
'tAnd how is one to tell good oil from
bad?"
every easily. The oil from really
fresh livers must be a very light yellow,
the lighter the better. Oil from decom-
posed livers is brown, and the slightest
dark tinge is good evidence that the
lvers were stale. The lighter the oil is
that is to say, the fresher the livers-
the less taste it has, so that the finest
quality has scarce any disagreeable flavor
at all. The darker the oil the nastier
it's smell and the more nauseating its
taste, for obvious reasons. Some people
imagine that the brownish oil has a
better effect, but that is nonsense, of
course. The brown oil is used for
leather dressing chiefly and to a very
great extent. You will notice once in a
while a pair of boots that has a horrible
smell like fish oil, and now you will
know the reason why. Cod liver oil is
sometimes adulterated, and if it has much
of a fishy smell you may reasonably sus-
pect it of having other fish oils combined
with it."
every curious stuff, is it not?"
"Not nearly so curious as some other
oils, of which we have small quantities
here in stock" said the apothecary. sin
this little bottle, for instance, is melon
oil, so called because its flavor re-
sembles that of the musk melon-a Sc
c~retion from the nose of the pilot whale.
It is an admirable lubricant for delicate
machinery, as is also this porpoise oil,
from that mammals jaw bone, so much
used by Watchmakers. The congealing
point of melon oil is so low, by the way,
that it remains liquid at zero, Fahren-
heit. And here is another queer oil,
from the fat under the legs of the Indus
River crocodile, the congealing point of
which is so high that it will freeze where
ice melts; it is famous leather dressing.
I have collected theses oils for curiosity
sake, beginning with some kinds that
are supposed to have medicinal value.
For example, I have in this bottle about
four ounces of alligator oil, which is
much used as a remedy for certain COM
plants in Brazil, as well as for an
illum1nant. The oil in the next vial to
! the right is from the big sea sunfsh, and
this other is from the fat beneath the
turtles upper shell; they are both recon-
mended for rheumatism. The oil in the
fat bottle is tried out Of the entraiIs of
cells and pickerel, and I had some oil
from the fat of the young guacharo bird
of Ecuador, which people in that coun-
try think is equal to olive oil for the
table, but, unfortunately, a careless
clerk of mine broke the bottle and I have