Chapter IV: Part 4

The legend which ascribes to the eating of human flesh the origin of one of the most loathsome of diseases, scarce offers a more horrible picture to the imagination than is presented by a letter recently published in the _Ceylon Examiner_. The beautiful islands of Mauritius and Bourbon are largely supplied with pork from Patna, a province of Hindostan that has been over-run by the cholera. Both there and at Calcutta the bodies of the natives are consigned to the Ganges, instead of being interred. ‘Let any person,’ says the writer in the Ceylon paper, ‘at daybreak start from the gates of Government House, Calcutta, and, whether his walk will be to the banks of the river or to the banks of the canals which on three sides surround the city, he will see pigs feeding on the dead bodies of the natives that have been thrown there during the night. During the day the river police clear away and sink all that remains of the bodies. Bad as is the metropolis of India it is nothing compared to Patna. Hundreds upon hundreds of human corpses are there strewed along the strand; and fattening, ghoule-like, upon these are droves upon droves of swine. These swine are slaughtered, cut up, and salted into hams, bacon, and pickled pork, and then despatched to Calcutta.... The great market for this poisonous swine produce is the Mauritius and Bourbon, where it is foisted on the inhabitants as the produce of Europe. Moreover, as these swine are sold in Calcutta at 3s. or 4s. each carcase, it is stated that the inferior class of homeward-bound vessels are provisioned with them, and thus this human-fed pork is introduced into Europe and America.’

Pork-eaters may believe as much of the following remarks as they please. ‘It is said that the Jews, Turks, Arabians, and all those who observe the precept of avoiding blood and swine’s flesh, are infinitely more free from disease than Christians; more especially do they escape those opprobria of the medical art, gout, scrofula, consumption, and madness. The Turks eat great quantities of honey and pastry, and much sugar; they also eat largely, and are indolent, and yet do not suffer from dyspepsia as Christians do. The swine-fed natives of Christendom suffer greater devastation from a tubercular disease of the bowels (dysentery) than from any other cause. Those persons who abstain from swine’s flesh and blood are infinitely more healthy and free from humors, glandular diseases, dyspepsia, and consumption; while in those districts, and among those classes, of men, where the pig makes the chief article of diet, tubercle in all its forms of eruptions, sore legs, bad eyes, abscesses, must prevail.’

These are the remarks of an American journalist, which, however, have not, I conceive, the shadow of foundation.

‘It appears somewhat singular,’ remarks Mr. Richardson, in his history of the pig, ‘that the flesh of the hog was prohibited in the ceremonial of the Jewish law; the same prohibition being afterwards borrowed by Mahomet, and introduced into the Koran.’ Great difference of opinion prevails as to the cause of this prohibition; some alleging that this food was unsuited to the land inhabited by the Jews. As, however, the kinds of food to be eaten and rejected--doubtless to prevent that luxurious epicurism unsuited to a growing and prosperous nation--were to have a limit, this limit was fixed by two distinctive marks: they must ‘divide the hoof, and chew the cud;’ that principle of restriction admitting only a limited range to the food permitted. The pig, the horse, and the camel were excluded. It was only in a state of low nationality, or in times of great degeneracy, that the Jew ever tasted pork.

The food of the hog varies in different localities, and probably materially influences the flavour of the meat. In the River Plata provinces they feed them on mutton. After describing the purchase--8,000 at _eighteen-pence per dozen_ (?)--by a Mr. M. Handy, a traveller adds, ‘As soon as the sheep became fattened on his own lands, he killed about a thousand, sold the fleeces at five shillings per dozen, and with the mutton he fed a herd of swine. Mentioning this fact to a large party of Europeans, at the dinner table of Lord Howden, when in Buenos Ayres, my statement was received with a murmur of scepticism; but I offered to accompany the incredulous to the pastures, where the remainder of the sheep were then feeding.’--(_Two Thousand Miles’ Ride through the Argentine Provinces._) But the Yankees beat this, according to a late American paper. In North America they generally feed them on maize, but in some of the States, apples form a principal portion of their food, and the ‘apple sauce’ thus becomes incorporated with the flesh. A gentleman travelling down East, overtook a farmer dragging a lean, wretched-looking, horned sheep along the road. ‘Where are you going with that miserable animal?’ asked the traveller. ‘I am taking him to the mutton mill, to have him ground over,’ said the farmer. ‘The _mutton mill_? I never heard of such a thing. I will go with you and witness the process.’ They arrived at the mill; the sheep was thrown alive into the hopper, and almost immediately disappeared. They descended to a lower apartment, and, in a few moments, there was ejected from a spout in the ceiling four quarters of excellent mutton, two sides of morocco leather, a wool hat of the first quality, a sheep’s head handsomely dressed, and two elegantly-carved powder horns.’

In America they speak of hogs as other countries do of their sugar, coffee, and general exportable staple crops; and even when packed and cured they occasionally compute the produce by the acre. Thus, the _Louisville Courier_ stated recently, that there were five or six _acres_ of barrelled pork piled up three tiers high, in open lots, and not less than six acres more not packed, which would make eighteen acres of barrels if laid side by side, exclusive of lard in barrels, and pork bulked down in the curing houses, sheds, &c. Besides the above slaughtered hogs, there were five or six acres more of live hogs in pens, waiting their destiny.

In the Western States pork is the great idea, and the largest owner of pigs is the hero of the prairie. What coal has been to England, wheat to the Nile or the Danube, coffee to Ceylon, gold to California and Victoria, and sheep to the Cape and Australia, pork has been to the West in America.

The phrase, ‘Going the whole hog,’ must have originated in Ohio, for there they use up the entire carcases of about three-quarters of a million of pigs, and the inhabitants are the most ‘hoggish’ community of the entire Union. What crocodiles were in Egypt, what cows are in Bengal, or storks in Holland, pigs are in Cincinnati, with this trifling difference, their sacredness of character lasts but as long as their mortal coil; and this is abbreviated without ceremony, and from the most worldly motives. In life, the pig is free, is honored; he ranges the streets, he reposes in thoroughfares, he walks beneath your horse’s legs, or your own; he is everywhere respected; but let the thread of his existence be severed, and--shade of Mahomet!--what a change! They think in Cincinnati of nothing but making the most of him.

Historically, socially, gastronomically, the pig demands our careful attention. The connection with commerce, with the cuisine, and even with the great interest of fire insurance, have all made him an object of particular regard. In the early days of the Celestial Empire--as we learn from the veracious writings of the witty and voracious essayist, Charles Lamb--a wealthy Chinaman was so unfortunate as to have his dwelling destroyed by fire. Prowling around the smoking ruins, and seeking to save some of his valuables which the conflagration might have spared, his hand came in contact with the smoking remains of a poor pig which had perished in the flames; instantly, smarting with the pain, he carried his hand to his mouth, when a peculiar flavour greeted his palate, such as the gods (Chinese ones I mean, of course,) might in vain have sighed for. Regardless of pain he applied himself once more, and drew forth from the smoking cinders the remains of the pig. Carefully brushing off the ashes, he regaled himself with the feast before him, but closely preserved the secret he had learned. In a few short months, however, the taste for roast pig came back so strong, that John Chinaman’s house was burned down again, and again was a pig found in the ashes. This was repeated so often that the neighbours grew suspicious, and watched until they ascertained that the reason for the conflagration was the feast that invariably followed. Once out, the secret spread like wildfire; every hill-top shone with the flames of a burning habitation--every valley was blackened with the ashes of a homestead; but roast pig was dearer to a Chinaman than home or honour, and still the work of destruction went on. Alarmed at a course which bid fair to ruin every insurance office in the empire, the directors petitioned in a body to the General Court of China, for the passing of an Act that should arrest the evil and avert their threatened ruin; and a careful examination of the revised statutes of China would probably show stringent resolutions against the crime of burning houses for the sake of roasting pigs.

Since the invention of the modern cooking stove, however, although incendiarism has decreased only in a slight degree, still it has ceased to be attributed to this cause, and a juicy crackling is no longer suggestive of fallen rafters, or a houseless family.

‘There is an old adage, ‘Give a dog a bad name, and his ruin is accomplished.’ Such may be true of the canine race; but the noble family of animals of which I am treating, furnishes a striking illustration that the proverb applies not to their numbers. A goose, it is said, saved lordly Rome by its cackling; and had not their list of Divinities just then been full, a grateful people would have found for him a sedgy pool and quiet nest in Olympus. How did the ancestors of that same people repay the pig for a service scarcely less important?

‘The veriest smatterer in the classics knows, that, when from flaming Troy ‘Æneas the great Anchises bore,’ seeking in strange lands a new home for his conquered people, a white sow, attended by thirty white little pigs, pure as herself, pointed out to him the scene of his future empire. But what did he and his people do for the pig in return? Did they load him with honours? Did they cherish him with corn? Did they treat him with respect? No! with black ingratitude, which still merits the indignation of every admirer of the pig, they affixed to the animal the appellation of _Porcus_; and ‘poor cuss’ the pig would have been to the present day, had not the Latin tongue long since ceased to be the language of the world. But, ‘poor cuss’ he is no longer, when in Worcester county he spurns his classic name, and, adopting the vernacular, he ‘grows the whole hog,’ that he may ‘pork us,’ in return for the care which we bestow upon him.

‘For the sake of our farmers, who are anxious to make a profit from pig-raising, it is greatly to be regretted that the thirty-at-a-litter breed has disappeared from the face of the earth. Breeding swine with such a rate of increase must be almost as profitable as ‘shaving’ notes at two per cent. per month; but still the impression is irresistibly forced upon us, that, in a family so numerous, those who came last to dinner, at least in their infant days, would not have gained flesh very rapidly. Indeed, in such a family it would seem almost impossible to dispense with the services of a wet nurse, in order to bring up profitably the rising generation.

‘The course of the pig, like that of the Star of Empire, has ever tended westward. From China we trace him to Italy, the gloomy mountains of the Hartz, the broad plains of Westphalia, the fertile valleys of France, and to the waving forests of ‘Merrie England;’ all have known him since the days when their bold barons and hungry retainers sat down to feast on the juicy chine of the wild boar, and the savoury haunch of venison. In green Erin, piggy has been an important member of society; true, he has shared his master’s meal, and basked in the comfortable warmth of his cabin; but, like a ‘gintleman’ as he is, he has ever paid the ‘rint;’ and St. Patrick, in the plenitude of his power and influence, never saw the day he could have banished him from that ‘gem of the ocean.’

‘When the pig first crossed to this western world remains in doubt. Whether he came with the Pilgrims, pressing with the foot of a pioneer the Blarney-stone of New England, and scanning with fearless eye the cheerless prospect before him, or whether, regardless of liberty of conscience, and careful only of his own comfort, he waited till the first trials and toils of a new settlement had been met and overcome, we have no record; enough for us that he is here; how or where he came concerns us not. He is among us and of us. From souse to sausage we have loved him; from ham to harslet we have honoured him; from chine to chops we have cherished him. The care we have shown him has been repaid a hundred-fold. He has loaded our tables, and lighted our fire-sides, and smiling plenty has followed in his steps, where hungry famine would have stalked in his absence.

‘But still further towards the setting sun has been the arena of the pig’s greatest triumphs; there have been the fields of his widest influence. Beneath the vast forests of Ohio, raining to the ground their yearly harvests of mast--through her broad corn-fields, stretching as far as the eye can see, he has roamed, and fed, and fattened. From him, and the commercial interests he has mainly contributed to establish, has grown a mighty State, scarcely second to any in this confederacy; from his ashes has arisen a new order in society--the ‘Bristleocracy of the great West.’

‘A broad levee bustling with business, lofty and spacious stores and slaughter-houses, crowded pens, and a river bearing on its bosom steamboats in fleets--all attest the interest which the pig has exerted on the agricultural and commercial interests of the great State of Ohio. He has filled the coffers of her bankers, and has bought the silks which cover her belles. He has built the beautiful palaces which adorn the ‘Queen City of the West,’ and feeds the princely luxury of those who inhabit them. _There_ he is almost an object of worship, and his position is considered as about equivalent to a patent of nobility. Fancy dimly paints the picture, when a few years hence, the wealthy pork merchant, who justly boasts his numerous _quarterings_, shall, in the true spirit of heraldry, paint on the pannel of his carriage, and on the escutcheon over his door-way, a lustrous shield, bearing in brilliant colours a single pig, his bristles all _rampant_, his tail closely _curlant_, and his mouth widely _opant_, till the lions, the griffins, and the unicorns of the Old World shall fade into insignificance before the heraldic devices of the New.’[7]

‘Your Spanish pig, who, by the way, is a no less important character in his country than is his cousin in Ireland, is not raised for the vulgar purpose of being fried to lard, or salted down to pork. He has, in fact, no more fat than he has hair on him. He is a long-legged, long-snouted, and long-tailed fellow, and would have been described by Plato as an animal without hairs. But though the pickings on his ribs be small, they are sweet. The Spaniard rolls the morsels under his tongue as he does his easily-besetting sins. It is nut-fed flesh; and has the flavour of acorns. This taste is as much prized in the roasted joint as that of the skin in the sherry. Pig is game in Spain. The porker does not live there in the chimney corner, and sit in the best arm-chair, as in Paddy’s cabin; but he roams the fields, and goes a-nutting with the boys and girls. He eats grass, as there are no cows to eat it; and would milk the goats, doubtless, if they would let him. He evidently knows more than the same animal in other countries; and is, in consequence, more willing to be driven. He will squeal when he feels the knife, but for no other reason. Nor is his squeal the same as that heard at the North. There are more vowel sounds in it. It is also less through the nose than in New England; and has some gutturals even farther down the throat than those of a Dutchman. Your wild boar is a monster compared with him. The flesh of the latter is to that of the former as the crisp brown of roast pig is to the tanned hide in your riding saddle. Accordingly, to refuse pork at a Spanish table is to pronounce yourself ‘of the circumcision;’ and should you decline a cut of a particularly nice ham, you would be set down as no better than a heathen. However, you never would do it--particularly after having read this essay. I assure you that when you may have eaten up all the chickens which were stowed away in your saddle bags, you cannot do better than to attack your landlord’s roast pig--provided you can get it. Only it may cost you dear in the reckoning, as it is thought a dish to set before the king. You may like pork, or you may not; but one thing is certain, it is the only meat in the Peninsula which has juices in it. Mutton may have a very little; and should you travel far in the country, you would see the day when you would be glad of a leg of it. But the beef is dry as ‘whittlings.’ An entire joint of roast beef would kill a man as effectually as a joist of timber. Whoever should undertake to live on Spanish beef a twelvemonth, would become at the end of that time what he was, in fact, at the beginning--wooden-headed. Make up your mind, therefore, to eat the meat of the uncircumcised, if you have any thought of going to Spain. You will often have to take your choice between that and nothing; and my word for it, ’tis much preferable. For the land is leaner far than pork; and happy is that traveller, who, when he is reduced to pickings, can find a spare-rib to work upon. Forewarned--forearmed.[8]’

Pork is the great food of the Brazilian people. It is prepared and eaten, according to Dr. Walshe, in a peculiar manner. When the pig is killed, the butcher dexterously scoops out the bones and muscular flesh, leaving behind only the covering of fat. In this state it is salted, folded up, and sent in great quantities to Rio, where it is called _toucinho_. All the stores and _vendas_ are full of it, and it is used commonly for culinary purposes, and forms an ingredient in every Brazilian article of cookery.

The flesh of the peccary (after cutting away the fetid orifice on its back) and of the wild or musk hog, both known under the Indian appellation of quanco in Trinidad, is much preferable to that of the domestic swine.

The flesh of the rhinoceros is eaten in Abyssinia, and by some of the Dutch settlers in the Cape Colony, and is in high esteem. The flesh of the hippopotamus used also to be eaten on the east coast of Africa, roasted or boiled, and fetched a high price as a delicacy. The fat was used in making puddings, instead of butter. The Portuguese settlers were permitted by the priests to eat the flesh of this animal in Lent, passing it off as _fish_ from its amphibious habits, and hence their consciences were at ease.

The flesh of the tapir, when roasted, closely resembles beef, especially if it be young; and that of the water hare is also considered excellent food, being white and delicate, and much of the same flavour as that of the tapir.

HORSE-FLESH.

At Paris, where all eccentricities are found, and even encouraged, one of the latest gastronomic innovations is the use of horse-flesh. The French are always adding to their dietetic regimen by introducing new articles of food. This social phenomenon of making the horse contribute to the nourishment of the human race, is not altogether new. The ancient Germans and Scandinavians had a marked liking for horse-flesh. The nomade tribes of Northern Asia make horse-flesh their favorite food. It has long been authorized and publicly sold in Copenhagen.

With the high ruling prices of butcher’s meat, what think you, gentlemen and housekeepers, of horse-flesh as a substitute for beef and mutton? Are you innocently ignorant of the French treatise of that eminent naturalist and professor of zoology, M. St. Hilaire, upon horse for food? Banquets of horse-flesh are at present the rage in Paris, Toulouse, and Berlin. The veterinary schools there pronounce horse-bone soup preferable beyond measure to the old-fashioned beef-bone liquid, and much more economical.

Horse-flesh steak without sauce, and cold, is cited as a morsel superior to the finest game that flies! and cut, too, from a horse nearly a quarter of a century old; one of the labouring cavalry kind who pranced at the sound of the trumpet, and snuffed the battle from afar off, little dreaming he was doomed to steaks, soup, and washing-day hashes. Horse-flesh pie, too, eaten cold, is a dainty now at Berlin and Toulouse, and boiled horse, _rechauffé_, has usurped the place of ragouts and secondary dishes! What a theme, hippophology, to write upon. We shall soon hear in our city dining rooms, ‘A piece o’ horse, my kingdom for a piece of horse!’ ‘Waiter! a cut from the fore-shoulder, well done.’ ‘A horse sandwich and ale, and the morning paper.’ Our witty friend _Punch_ had its horse-laugh recently upon the subject of the sensation this movement has created in equestrian circles.

A Frenchman, observes a recent writer, was one day remonstrating against the contempt expressed by Englishmen for French beef, the inferiority of which he would not admit. ‘I have been two times in England,’ said he, ‘but I nevere find the beef so supérieur to ours. I find it vary convenient that they bring it you on leetle pieces of stick for one penny, but I do not find the beef supérieur.’ ‘Good gracious!’ exclaimed the Englishman, ‘you have been eating cats’ meat for beef.’ What this Frenchman did in the innocence of his heart, his countrymen now do, it seems, with _malice prepense_.

And a Frenchman of considerable reputation, in a letter on alimentary substances, and especially upon the flesh of the horse, calls upon the whole world to put aside, what he considers, an ancient and absurd prejudice, and to realize at home that famous sentence in the geography we used to read at school, which, under the head of Norway, informed us ‘horse-flesh is publicly sold in the markets.’

‘M. Isidore St. Hilaire is very serious. He does not merely advocate the fillet of horse-flesh--the mare soup and fricasseed colt--in sarcastic allusion to the practice of Parisian restaurants. He comes gravely forward, with chapters of scientific evidence and argument, to contend that, while animal food is absolutely necessary to the proper nourishment of the human race, millions of Frenchmen eat no animal food, and every year millions of pounds of excellent meat are wasted. He knows how the cause he advocates lends itself to ridicule--he knows how difficult it has always been to get rid of a prejudice--he knows the fate of innovators; but, though a Frenchman, he braves ridicule, brings a heavy battery of facts to destroy what he deems a prejudice, and is already experiencing some of the triumph which follows a hard-won victory. For seven years he has been advocating the desirableness of eating horse-flesh--for seven or eight years he has been collecting evidence and gaining converts--and now he feels strong enough to appeal to the European public in a small volume.[9]

‘Since then, Germany has had its ‘Banquets of Horse-flesh’ for the wits to ridicule--public feastings at which ‘cats’ meat’ was served in various forms, as soup, as bouilli, as fillet, as cutlet; and all the feasters left the table converted hippophagists. In 1841, horse-flesh was adopted at Ochsenhausen and Wurtemburg, where it is now publicly sold under the surveillance of the police. Every week five or six horses are brought to market. At the Lake of Constance, a large quantity of this meat is also sold. In 1842, a banquet of 150 persons inaugurated its public use at Königsbaden, near Stuttgard. In 1846, the police of Baden authorized its public sale, and Schaffhausen followed in the same year. In 1847, at Detmold and at Weimar, public horse-flesh banquets were held with great _éclat_--in Karlsbad (Bohemia) and its environs, the new beef came into general use--and at Zittau, 200 horses are eaten annually. At Ling, after one of these banquets, the police permitted the sale of horse-flesh, which is now general in Austria, Bohemia, Saxony, Hanover, Switzerland, and Belgium. The innovation made rapid converts. In 1853, Berlin had no less than five _abattoirs_, where 150 horses were killed and sold. At Vienna, in 1853, there was a riot to prevent one of these banquets; but in 1854, such progress had been made, that 32,000 pounds weight were sold in fifteen days, and at least 10,000 of the inhabitants habitually ate horse-flesh.’ And now Parisian banquets of horse-flesh are common.

These facts are at all events curious. Think of the prejudices to be overcome, and think how unreasoning is the stomach!

Young horses are too valuable to be brought to the shambles, unless killed by accident. But our worn-out hacks, of which 250 or 300 die or are killed weekly in the metropolis,--old horses used up, are capable, we are assured, of furnishing good meat. An old horse, which had done duty for twenty-five years, was the substance of a learned gastronomic feast at Paris.

M. St. Hilaire, the champion of this new addition to our food resources, reasons in this fashion:--‘Horse-flesh has long been regarded as of a sweetish disagreeable taste, very tough, and not to be eaten without difficulty. So many different facts are opposed to this prejudice, that it is impossible not to recognize its slight foundation. The free or wild horse is hunted as game in all parts of the world where it exists--Asia, Africa, and America--and formerly, and perhaps even now, in Europe. The domestic horse itself is made use of as alimentary as well as auxiliary--in some cases altogether alimentary--in Africa, America, Asia, and in some parts of Europe.

‘Its flesh is relished by people the most different in their manner of life, and of races the most diverse, negro, Mongol, Malay, American, Caucasian. It was much esteemed up to the eighth century among the ancestors of some of the greatest nations of Western Europe, who had it in general use, and gave it up with regret. Soldiers to whom it has been served out, and people in towns who have bought it in markets, have frequently taken it for beef. Still more often, and indeed habitually, it has been sold in restaurants, even in the best, as venison, and without the customers ever suspecting the fraud or complaining of it.

‘And further, if horse-flesh has been often accepted as good under a false name, it has also been pronounced good by those who, to judge of its qualities, have submitted it to careful experiment, and by all who have tasted it in a proper condition, that is, when taken from a sound and rested horse, and kept sufficiently long. It is then excellent roasted; and if it be not so acceptable as _bouilli_, it is precisely because it furnishes one of the best soups--perhaps the best that is known.

‘It is good also, as experiments prove made by myself as well as others, when taken from old horses not fattened, whose age was 16, 19, 20, and even 23 years, animals thought worth no more than a few francs beyond the value of their skin.

‘This is a capital fact, since it shows the possibility of utilizing a second time, for their flesh, horses which have already been utilized up to old age for their strength; and, consequently, of obtaining a further and almost gratuitous profit at the end of their life, after they had well nigh paid the cost of their rearing and keep by their labour.’

Let us see what additional evidence M. St. Hilaire has to adduce. First, he appeals to his long experience at the _Jardin des Plantes_, where the greater part of the _carnivora_ are habitually fed on horse-flesh, which keeps them healthy in spite of many unfavourable conditions. But this will not carry much weight with it. Our digestion is not quite so good as that of a lion. The condor has been known to eat, with satisfaction, food which Mrs. Brown would find little to her taste. No dietetic rule for men can be deduced from the digestions of tigers. We prefer the experience of human stomachs. Fortunately this is not wanting, and M. St. Hilaire collects an imposing mass of evidence. Huzard, the celebrated veterinary surgeon, records, that during the revolution, the population of Paris was for six months dieted with horse-flesh, without any ill effects. Some complaints, indeed, were made when it was found that the _beef_ came from horses; but, in spite of prejudice and the terrors such a discovery may have raised, no single case of illness was attributed to the food. Larrey, the great army surgeon, declares that on very many occasions during the campaigns, he administered horse-flesh to the soldiers, and to the soldiers sick in the hospital; and instead of finding it injurious, it powerfully contributed to the convalescence of the sick, and drove away a scorbutic epidemic which attacked the men. The testimony of Parent Duchâtelet is also quoted to the same effect. M. St. Hilaire feels himself abundantly authorized to declare that horse-flesh, far from being unwholesome, is one of the most nutritious and wholesome of alimentary substances: and, to support this declaration, he adduces the testimony of historians and travellers, showing how whole tribes and nations have habitually eaten and highly esteemed it.

Having thus, as he considers, satisfactorily settled the question of wholesomeness, M. St. Hilaire proceeds to deal with the question of agreeableness. Is wholesome horse-flesh agreeable enough to tempt men, not starving, to eat it? It is, of course, of little use that historians and travellers tell of hippophagists--it is nothing to the purpose that soldiers in a campaign, or citizens during a siege, have eaten horses with considerable relish. Under such circumstances, one’s old shoe is not to be despised as a _pièce de résistance_; and one’s grandmother may be a toothsome morsel. The real point to be settled in the European mind is this--apart from all conditions which must bias the judgment, is horse-flesh pleasant to the taste? M. St. Hilaire cites the evidence of eminent men who, having eaten it knowing what it was, pronounced it excellent--all declaring that it was better than cow-beef, and some that there was little difference between it and ox-beef.

But perhaps the reader, having eaten German beef, has a not ill-grounded suspicion that horse-flesh might bear honourable comparison with such meat, and yet be at best of mediocre savour. Let us, therefore, says a writer in the _Saturday Review_, cite the example of Parisian banquets, where the convives were men accustomed to the _Trois Frères_, _Philippe’s_, and the _Café de Paris_. M. Renault, the director of the great Veterinary College at Alfort, had a horse brought to him with an incurable paralysis of the hinder extremities. It was killed, and three days afterwards, on the 1st December, 1855, eleven guests were invited--physicians, journalists, veterinary surgeons, and _employés_ of the government. Side by side were dishes prepared by the same cook, in precisely the same manner, and with the same pieces taken respectively from this horse and from an ox of good quality. The _bouillon_ of beef was flanked by a _bouillon_ of horse, the _bouilli_ of beef by a _bouilli_ of horse, the fillet of roast beef by a fillet of roast horse; and a comparison was to be made of their qualities. Dr. Amédée Latour thus writes:--

‘_Bouillon de cheval._--Surprise générale! C’est parfait, c’est excellent, c’est nourri, c’est corse, c’est aromatique, c’est riche de goût.

‘Le bouillon de _bœuf_ est bon, mais _comparativement inférieur_, moins accentué de goût, moins parfumé, moins résistant de sapidité.’

The jury unanimously pronounced the horse _bouillon_ superior to that of the ox. The _bouilli_, on the contrary, they thought inferior to that of good beef, although superior to ordinary beef, and certainly superior to all cow-beef. The roast fillet, again, they found superior to that of the ox; and M. Latour thus sums up the experiment:--

Un bouillon supérieur;
Un bouilli bon et très-mangeable;
Un rôti exquis.

Similar experiments have been subsequently tried, several times in Paris and in the provinces. They have been tried under three different conditions. First, the guests have known what they were going to eat; secondly, they have been totally ignorant; and thirdly, they have been warned that they were going to eat something quite novel. Yet in every case, we are told, the result has been the same. It is right to add, that the author anticipates the objection that the animals selected were young horses in splendid condition, and that such horses are too valuable to be sent to the butcher. The majority of these experiments have, we are assured, been made at veterinary colleges, upon horses incapacitated by age or accident from further work. The horse which M. Renault served up to his friends had already _vingt-trois ans de bons et loyaux services_. He was in good ‘condition’--that is to say, well-fleshed, although paralysed. In fact, all the horses, it is asserted, were such as are sold for fifteen or twenty francs--not such as are the pride of our stables. The younger the horse, the better his flesh; and as young horses die daily from accidents, these, we presume, would form the ‘prime cuts.’ But old horses, used up, unfit even for cabs, if allowed a little rest, are capable, we are assured, of furnishing beef better than cow-beef. But this serving up of horse-flesh is equalled by that of the maître de cuisine to the Maréchal Strezzi, who, at the siege of Leith, according to Monsieur Beaujeu, ‘made out of the hind quarter of one salted horse forty-five _couverts_, that the English and Scottish officers and nobility who had the honour to dine with the Monseigneur, upon the rendition, could not tell what the devil any one of them were made upon at all.’ M. St. Hilaire discusses at great length many other objections, with which we need not here trouble ourselves. But the taste is spreading and the advocates increasing. The public use of horse-flesh as human food is spoken of approvingly in _Blackwood_.

The _New York Tribune_ thus endorses the fanatical idea of the French _savans_, (more properly _ravens_,) as to the propriety of eating horse-flesh:--

‘In the horse we have an animal which is much cleaner in its habits than the hog, herbivorous like the ox or sheep, whose flesh is rich in nitrogen, and as pleasant to the taste as that of either of the above-named animals. What prevents horse-flesh from being found on our tables? Nothing but a popular prejudice, which recent investigations in Paris show is entirely without any foundation whatever.

‘8,000 horses die, it is said, in New York annually, or about 22 per day’ (a great exaggeration no doubt); ‘but instead of fetching 17 or 18 dollars to press the carcase for grease, and to feed the hogs on to make pork for export, the prices will be greatly enhanced for meat for home consumption.’

Thus writes the Paris correspondent of the _Indépendance Belge_:--‘You know what interest is attached to-day--and very naturally so--to all questions relating to the public food. In connexion therewith, I have to mention a fact which is both curious and odd; it is, that there is being formed in Paris a society of economists, naturalists, and hardy gourmands, having for aim the introduction of horse-flesh into the category of butchers’ meat. It may perhaps be said, that this social phenomenon is not altogether new. Ten years ago, _hippophagy_ made some noise in Germany, and, if I remember right, a society of eaters of the horse was formed, and attempted a public festival, at which all the meat should be of that quadruped, but were interrupted by the public, who, feeling their prejudices wounded, broke the tables to pieces. At Paris, where all eccentricities are found, and even encouraged, there is nothing of that kind to fear. Accordingly, _hippophagy_ progresses. Do not consider this an exaggeration. The last number of the _Revue des Cours Publics_ will prove to you, by means of a summary, that M. Geoffroy de St. Hilaire has made the subject the theme of one of his recent lectures, and that the learned professor was greatly applauded. I should add that his auditors included economists, agriculturists, and heads of benevolent institutions. When the orator concluded by saying that the day was come when the horse ought to contribute to the nourishment of the human race, as well as the ox, the sheep, and the pig, a hundred voices cried in chorus, ‘_Oui! oui! très bien!_’ This question, strange at first sight, has been raised, and it will not sleep again. I predict that it will have not only numerous adherents, but eloquent fanatics. As a commencement, many of the auditors wished to eat horse soup, horse steaks, and the same flesh under other forms.’ At the time at which I write, dissertations are made, _brochures_ written, the regulations of a _hippophagic_ society drawn up, and the establishment of horse shambles demanded. In 1832, M. Alphonse Karr, mocking the extreme zeal of the society for protection, exclaimed--‘Philanthropists! the horse has carried man long enough; it is now for man to carry the horse!’

There is very little doubt that horse-flesh, besides its application for ‘cats’ meat,’ enters, even now, largely into surreptitious use in certain quarters in this country as food for bipeds. Thus, a Blackburn paper tells us that ‘on Monday last Mr. Laverty seized and confiscated the carcase of a horse. The animal had been stuck and bled, and was taken very near to the premises of a noted brawn and black-pudding maker. We understand that horse-flesh is used in this town by a certain vender and manufacturer of brawn.’

Hoffman and Burns, makers and venders of horse-meat sausages, at Philadelphia, were recently tried, convicted, and sentenced to eighteen months’ imprisonment. _Apropos_ of sausages, judging from the following anecdote, home-made ones are the more attractive.

‘A minister in one of our orthodox churches, while on his way to preach a funeral sermon in the country, called to see one of his members, an old widow lady, who lived near the road he was travelling. The old lady had just been making sausages, and she felt proud of them--they were so plump, round, and sweet. Of course she insisted on her minister taking some of the links home to his family. He objected on account of not having his portmanteau along with him. This objection was soon over-ruled, and the old lady, after wrapping them in a rag, carefully placed a bundle in either pocket of the preacher’s capacious great coat. Thus equipped, he started for the funeral.

‘While attending to the solemn ceremonies of the grave, some hungry dogs scented the sausages, and were not long in tracking them to the pockets of the good man’s over-coat. Of course this was a great annoyance, and he was several times under the necessity of kicking these whelps away. The obsequies at the grave completed, the minister and congregation re-passed to the church, where the funeral discourse was to be preached.

‘After the sermon was finished, the minister halted to make some remarks to his congregation, when a brother who wished to have an appointment given out, ascended the steps of the pulpit, and gave the minister’s coat a hitch to get his attention. The divine, thinking it a dog having designs upon his pocket, raised his foot, gave a sudden kick, and sent the good brother sprawling down the steps!

‘You will excuse me, brethren and sisters,’ said the minister, confusedly, and without looking at the work he had just done, ‘for I could not avoid it--I have sausages in my pocket, and that dog has been trying to grab them ever since I came upon the premises!’[10]

The reader may judge of the effect such an announcement would have at a funeral. Tears of sorrow were suddenly exchanged for smiles of merriment.

Mr. Richardson, officer of the Local Board of Health of Newton Heath, near Manchester, gave the following evidence before Mr. Scholefield’s Committee on Adulteration, before whom I was also examined as a witness.

‘We have in Newton five knackers’ yards, and there is only one in Manchester. The reason is, that they have so much toleration in Newton; and it has been a great source of profit to them, because they have the means of selling the best portions of the horse-flesh to mix with the potted meats.

‘I can say for a fact, that the tongues of horses particularly, and the best portions, such as the hind quarters of horses, are generally sold to mix with collared brawn, or pigs’ heads, as they are called with us, and for sausages and polonies. I understand, also, from those who have been in the habit of making them, that horse-flesh materially assists the making of sausages; It is a hard fibrin, and it mixes better, and keeps them hard, and they last longer in the shop window before they are sold, because otherwise the sausages run to water, and become soft and pulpy. I believe horse-flesh also materially assists German sausages; it keeps them hard.’

The instinct of the dog, the cat, and the rat, are so well known that one anecdote will suffice to illustrate the three. A terrier and a tom cat were pursuing a large rat down a street. The rat was almost caught, when it dodged suddenly and ran into a sausage shop. The cat and dog stopped convulsively at the door; and, looking at the sausages, hung their heads, and slunk away terror-stricken.

But in other quarters than England, unwholesome and infected meat is vended, for a year or two ago the editor of the _Madras Athenæum_ thus wrote:--

‘We question whether since the days of Pelops a more filthy dish was ever offered to human beings, than those which are daily served up to the European inhabitants of Madras. With respect to the state of our market, we have never seen a more disgusting receptacle of all kinds of abominations than that market presents.

‘A lazar house it seemed, wherein were laid
Numbers of all diseased.’

‘Unfortunate beings in the worst stages of leprosy, naked, and covered all over with the livid spots of that hideous disease, standing at the stalls, handling the meat, and talking with the butchers, is a sight as common as it is horrible. As for the small-pox, that is almost too abundant to allow of any cases being particularly noticed. It is very conspicuous on the native, on account of the pustules being white. The only disease bearing any resemblance to it is the itch. We have ourselves observed a dirty fellow, with his hands covered all over with one of these nauseous eruptions, coolly walking down the whole length of a set of stalls, and clapping those abominable hands, in a lazy manner, upon every piece of meat within his reach. Faugh! The very thought smells. When we were last there, the place swarmed with pariah dogs, the effect of which was to render the stench and filth accumulated round the stalls perfectly unbearable. We are aware the subject is a nasty one, but at the risk of spoiling the breakfast of Brown, Jones, or Robinson, as they take up our damp sheet this morning, we make the evil conspicuous, and bring it plainly into notice, that measures may be taken to sink it into oblivion ever after. If one could jest upon such a subject, one might say, that the market of Madras is as much the morning lounge of the filthiest wretches in the place, as the stables of Taylor and Co. are the morning rendezvous of the rank and fashion, who there do congregate, to look at the Australians and Arabs ushered to their notice under the winning smile of the worthy head partner. Is not the thought horrible, too, that the fairer part of the creation, who should be fed on

‘Sugar and spice
‘And all that’s nice,

are offered such filthy and infected stuff?

‘We should also recommend attention being called to the practice, which we are afraid prevails, of ‘blowing the meat,’ to give it a good appearance. This is a cognizable offence, and butchers have, on occasion, most deservedly received a dozen or two for it; but the inducement to make their meat look tempting by filling it with breath, not quite so ‘fragrant as the flower of Amrou,’ is too profitable, we fear, to be disregarded upon the vague and distant contingency of a flogging or a fine. If the functionaries who are employed to superintend the market are insufficient in number, it would surely be poor economy not to increase them. If they are inattentive and remiss, discharge them. It would be pennywise, indeed, for a few paltry rupees a month, to allow a Secretary to Government, or a Member of Council, whose wisdom and experience have been purchased at an immense cost to the country, to be poisoned, which at present they are liable to be, by infected meat.

‘If by calling attention to the subject, some improvement is made, our object will be attained. We will gladly run the chance of spoiling a few dinners. Jones of the club, as he takes the cover off one of Maltby’s best _entrées_, may for once think of the leprous hand that has handled it; Brown may fancy for once he will catch small-pox from his beef-steak; Robinson may think of the dog licking the leg of mutton from which his whack is taken, and all may heartily anathematise the _Athenæum_ for telling them the truth, but we will cheerfully put up with their wry faces and abuse, if the necessary reform we advocate be attained.’

Sam Slick, in his truthful, but satirical vein, alludes to the disguises of fashionable cookery.--‘Veal’ (he says) ‘to be good, must look like anything else but veal. You mustn’t know it when you see it, or it’s vulgar; mutton must be incog, too; beef must have a mask on; any thin’ that looks solid, take a spoon to; any thin’ that looks light, cut with a knife; if a thing looks like fish, you take your oath it is flesh; and if it seems real flesh, it’s only disguised, for it’s sure to be fish; nothin’ must be nateral--natur is out of fashion here. This is a manufacturin’ country; everything is done by machinery, and _that_ that aint, must be made to look like it; and I must say, the dinner machinery is perfect.’

If horses are eaten, why not donkeys? The animal is more rare, and hence it would be the greater delicacy. The Greeks ate donkeys, and we must suppose they had their reasons for it. Has any modern stomach in Europe been courageous enough, knowingly, to try it?

The flesh of the common ass, though never eaten by us, is esteemed a delicacy in some countries, particularly in Tartary. The northern climate, pasturage, and freedom may have some effect on the flesh.

Travellers affirm that dogs’ flesh, which with us is intolerable, is one of the most savoury meats, when the animal has been kept for some time in the warm, tropical regions. This cannot, however, apply to the brutish pariah dogs that infest the streets of Madras, Constantinople, and other eastern towns.

The Roman peasants found the flesh of the ass palatable, and the celebrated Mæcenas having tasted it, introduced it to the tables of the great and rich, but the fashion of eating it lasted no longer than his life. Galen compares the flesh of the ass to that of the stag. It is said to be eaten plentifully in the low eating-houses of Paris, under the denomination of veal. The flesh of the wild ass is eaten by the Tartars, and is said to be very delicate and good, but when killed in a tame state, it is hard and unfit for food.

The wild ass, called Koulan by the Persians, is still common in many parts of Central Asia, from the 48° of North latitude to the confines of India. The Persians and Tartars hold its flesh in high esteem, and hunt it in preference to all other descriptions of game. Olearius assures us, that he saw no fewer than 32 wild asses slain in one day, by the Shah of Persia and his court, the bodies of which were sent to the royal kitchens at Ispahan; and we know from Martial, that the epicures of Rome held the flesh of the Onager, or wild ass, in the same estimation as we do venison.

Cum tener est _Onager_, solaque lalisio matre
Pascitur; hoc infans, sed breve nomen habet.

[Martial, xiii. 97.]

From a passage in Pliny (lib. viii., c. 44), it would appear, that the Onager inhabited Africa; and that the most delicate and best flavoured _lalisiones_, or fat foals, were brought from that continent to the Roman markets. Leo Africanus repeats the same story of wild asses being found in Africa, but no traveller has since met with them; and, as far as we at present know, the species is confined to Asia.

The quaggas (_Asinus Quagga_) are often hunted in Africa by the Dutch for their skins, of which they make large bags to hold their grain, and by the Hottentots and other natives, who are very fond of their flesh.

Lieutenant Moodie (_Ten Years in South Africa_) says, ‘Being one morning at the house of a neighbouring farmer who had just shot one of these animals, I requested that he would have a piece of the flesh cooked for my breakfast. His ‘frow’ expressed some disgust at my proposal, but ordered a small bit to be grilled, with butter and pepper. I did not find it at all unpalatable, and certainly it was better than horse-flesh, to which I had been treated in the hospital at Bergen-op-Zoom in 1814, when lying wounded there, after the unfortunate failure of that well-planned attack.’

RUMINANTIA.

The ruminants furnish, as is well known, the largest portion of our animal food, being consumed by man alike in civilized or unsettled countries. The domestic animals require little notice at our hands. There are, however, some whose flesh is eaten in different countries that are less familiar. Thus the bison and musk-ox of North America, the reindeer of Greenland and Northern Europe--the various antelopes, the gnu, the giraffe, and the camel of Africa, and the alpaca tribe of South America, supply much of the animal food of the people in the districts where they are common.

The flesh of the camel is dry and hard, but not unpalatable. Heliogabalus had camels’ flesh and camels’ feet served up at his banquets. In Barbary, the tongues are salted and smoked for exportation to Italy and other countries, and they form a very good dish. The flesh is little esteemed by the Tartars, but they use the hump cut into slices, which, dissolved in tea, serves the purpose of butter.

The flesh of the Axis deer (_Cervus axis_, or _Axis maculata_) is not much esteemed in Ceylon, having little fat upon it, and being very dry. The India samver, or musk deer, is eaten there.

The flesh of the great moose deer or elk, of North America, the carcase of which weighs 1,000 or 1,200 lbs., is as valuable for food as beef, but from its immense size, much of the flesh is usually left in the forest.

It is more relished by the Indians and persons resident in the fur countries, than that of any other animal, and bears a greater resemblance in its flavour to beef than to venison. It is said that the external fat is soft like that of a breast of mutton, and when put into a bladder is as fine as marrow.

The flesh of the caribboo, a smaller animal, rarely exceeding 400 lbs., is less palatable than moose venison. Nor is the flesh of the red or Virginian deer much better, although the venison dried is very good.