are delicacies; that the natives of New Caledonia should be very partial to a large spider, which they consider quite a bonne bouche, may not seem strange after our previous observations; but let us turn to Europe. Will it be believed that spiders have been relished as delicacies within the confines of civilization? We must not dispute about taste. Réaumur was acquainted with a young lady who ate spiders as fast as she could capture them. Another lady, Anna Maria Schurmann, used to eat them like nuts, which she declared they resembled in flavour; and M. Lalande, the celebrated astronomer, was equally fond of these delicacies.

Rözel was acquainted with a gentleman who used to spread them upon bread, as a luscious substitute for butter. We have never ourselves ventured to try them; but what are spiders compared to centipedes? Humboldt assures us that he has seen Indian children drag monsters eighteen inches long out of their holes in the earth, and quietly devour them.

Such is a sketch of man's insectivorous diet; but why should a spider be not equal to a shrimp, or a fat moth to a carrionfeeding crayfish? We are all more or less the slaves of prejudice.

Our last observation leads us to a not unpardonable digression from insect diet to an enumeration of other strange articles belonging to the animal kingdom, which are regarded, some as delicacies, others as ordinary staples of consumption.

Confining ourselves within the boundaries of Europe, we may state that in Spain and along the coast of Italy a species of seaurchin (Echinus*), a species of sea-anemone or sea-flower (Actinia), to say nothing of slugs and snails (Helix Pomatia), are used as food. We need scarcely allude to frogs (Rana viridis), the hindquarters of which are so much esteemed in the Netherlands and France, or to sea-turtles, which every London citizen holds in due estimation. In Brazil a land-tortoise, the shell of which is very elegant, takes the place of our turtle, (a reptile drafted from the Caribbean islands, and others, to which shoals of these sea-winged creatures resort in the breeding season).

In savage countries everything eatable is eaten; but in extra European lands, where the community cannot be said to be uncivilized, the earth-worm, the rat, and other such "small deer" are more than acceptable; but among delicacies there held in estimation, we may mention certain slug-like marine creatures of large size, called

* Echinus esculentus. "L'oursin commun-on mange au printemps ses ovaires crus qui sont rougeâtres et d'un goût assez agréable.”—Cuvier.

sea-cucumbers, or Tripe de mer (Holuthuria and Siphunculus), for the fishery of which thousands of small vessels (proas) are employed in the Malayan seas, their cargo of dried material being transferred to Chinese merchant-ships trading with the fishers. To this article we may add sharks' fins (richly gelatinous) and birds' nests; that is to say, the nests of certain swallows (Hierundo), which, in some islands of the Indian Archipelago, make their abode in deep and dangerous caverns. These nests (of which we have seen many specimens) have a foundation of gelatinous matter resembling coarse isinglass, doubtless the secretion of certain salivary glands in the throat; they resemble martins' nests under the eaves of houses, but are shallower, and open altogether at the rim, and are lined inside with feathers and various soft materials. It is the nest itself which is used, the lining matters being cleared away. As a stock for soup these nests are said to be very excellent; and a friend, who has partaken in China of the products of a Chinese kitchen, speaks in high terms of birds'nest soup, but he never inquired (wisely we think) into the nature of the addenda, perchance corrigenda.

To the natives of high arctic latitudes blubber and train-oil are necessities; but, as delicacies, the uncleansed intestines are eagerly devoured: and the comminuted lichen moss from the paunch of the reindeer forms a welcome addition to the repast of the Greenlander or the Samoiede.

On the other hand, in Senegal, during the harvest of gum, the natives live entirely upon this vegetable exudation, and become fat upon it. Snakes are eaten by the Siamese, and the electrical eel in South America.

To the Chinese, earthworms are as acceptable as they are to fishes and birds; but there are worse things eaten by civilized man than even these-let not our reader start with dismay. There are certain parasitic worms of very simple structure, which take up their abode in the inside of various fresh-water fishes, around the intestines of which they so entwine themselves, as not unfrequently to destroy life. At certain times these parasites pierce through the sides of the abdomen, and so make their exit. One of these worms (Ligula), which infects the Bream, attains to the length of five feet. Strange as are the tastes of men, who would suppose that such parasitic worms (creatures allied to the tape-worm) would enter into a dietary catalogue? The idea is disgusting, yet Cuvier says, "These worms are regarded in some parts of Italy as an agreeable viand." In what manner they are cooked we are 2 N

VOL. II.

not informed. Revolting must the dish be, however prepared or disguised.

We have hitherto spoken of organic matters alone as included in man's bill of fare; but inorganic substances are not altogether rejected. In a certain district on the Continent, a fine meal-like powder, collected on the borders of a lake, is made up with flour into a sort of bread. This meal consists of the exuviæ of minute animalcules, deposited through a series of ages.

Humboldt assures us that the Ottomaques on the banks of the Meta and Orinoco, feed on a fat unctuous clay; they collect it carefully, and knead it into balls, which they bake slightly before a slow fire. The New Caledonians have a similar custom, especially in times of scarcity.-(Laballardière.)

This clay, according to recent microscopic observation, consists principally of extinct animalcules, and therefore is perhaps not altogether destitute of animal nutriment: such is the opinion of Humboldt, who observes that "the vast quantity of clay which the Ottomaques consume, and the greediness with which they devour it, seem to prove that it does more than distend their hungry stomachs.”

The use of clay, but in a limited degree, prevails among the negroes of Guinea, and also of the West Indies.

The Tungooses and Koriaks also make use of an unctuous clay; and even the German workmen at the mountain of Kiffhönser, it is affirmed, spread clay upon their bread instead of butter.

In Siberia, when pressed by hunger during winter, wolves and other quadrupeds have been known to devour clay, or friable steatite; an indication that some nutriment is to be obtained therefrom, otherwise instinct would not direct them to select it in preference to other earth.

We know not that man has ever been subjected to the necessity of testing in his own person the nutritive properties of coal; but pigs occasionally have been, and have not only lived upon it for some time, but been preserved in better condition than might have been expected. We need not say that coal is of vegetable origin.

6

Here we close our short survey of this strange bill of fare.
W. C. L. M.

Give credit to thy mortal brother's heart
For all the good, that in thine own hath part.

LETTERS FROM ALABAMA.-No. VI.

July 1st.

THE Indian Corn (Zea mays) is in all its glory; few plants have a more noble appearance than the variety of maize cultivated here; the northern corn is a pigmy to it. It grows to the height of ten feet; the stem strong and thick, surrounded and partially enveloped in its large flag-like leaves, here and there the swelling ears projecting from the stalk, each enclosed in its membranous sheath, from the extremity of which the pendulous shining filaments hang out, called the silk, and which are the pistils of the female flowers; and the tall elegant spike of male flowers, called the tassel, crowns the whole. The full-ripe ears are often nearly a foot in length, and seven or eight inches in circumference; the grains are very closely set, and in growing pinch each other up into a square form; the cob, or pithy placenta which remains after the grains have been shelled off, is as large as a full ear of the northern corn. It is now in that agreeable condition already alluded to, called roasting-ear," the grains being formed, but yet quite soft and pulpy. Some go into the field and gather the ears, and bite off the grains while raw, when they have a sugary taste; but they are more commonly used as a culinary vegetable, roasted at the fire, or boiled and shelled like peas, and eaten with melted butter. It is considered a delicacy; but as the ripening corn rapidly hardens, it lasts only a few days. Not only squirrels, but rabbits, bears, and many other wild animals, have a similar taste for roasting-ears, and do not scruple to indulge their partiality at the farmer's expense. Corn is almost the only bread-stuff raised here, the wheaten flour used being imported chiefly from the north. Cotton and corn divide the plantations.

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The steep banks of many of the winding creeks and branches are densely clothed, for considerable portions of their darkling course, with tall canes (Miegia macrosperma). When the country was first settled, the cane-brakes were much more extensive, and only penetrable by means of the axe. But many of them have been cut down; and the depredations of the cattle, which are very fond of the plant, eating off the tender and succulent shoots, keep down its growth, and prevent its attaining anything like the height and size which formerly characterised it. The whole plant has the appearance of a gigantic grass, with long, narrow, spearshaped leaves, of a beautiful green, crowned with a bunch of

seedy-looking flowers like those of a rush; the stalk or cane, when growing, is straight, green, and pliable; but, after being cut, soon becomes bright yellow, and, though elastic, acquires hardness and firmness, and makes nice walking-sticks, fishing-rods, &c. I have pressed these canes into the service of entomology, by cutting those of suitable size and length, and after drying them a few days, using them as handles for my butterfly-net, for which their lightness and strength make them very fit. It is said that when cane has been cut, and is so dry that it will burn, it is a holiday amusement of the negroes to set fire to a cane-brake thus prepared. The rarefied air in the hollow compartments of the cane bursts them with a report not much inferior to a discharge of musketry; and the burning of a cane-brake makes a noise as of a conflicting army, in which thousands of muskets are continually discharged. It rises from the ground like the richest asparagus, with a large succulent stem; and it grows six feet high before this succulency and tenderness harden into wood. When five years old, it shoots up its fine head of seed, like that of broom-corn; the seeds are large and farinaceous, and were used by the Indians as bread

corn.

In similar situations another plant is numerous, which gives a still more tropical air to the landscape: I allude to the common Fan-palm (Chamaerops serrulata). It grows in the form of a low bush, without any stem, having many leaves. They are about two feet in diameter, attached to a footstalk of about eighteen inches, from the end of which the leaf diverges in every direction, like a broad and nearly circular fan, folded in very regular plaits. Near the edge the plaits are divided, and each is pointed. The leaf is thick and leathery, but somewhat liable to split if forcibly unfolded. The cattle eat the tips of these leaves too, and spoil the elegant regularity of their form. Indeed, in summer, the poor creatures are hardly beset to procure a due allowance of proper food; they are turned adrift into the forest to browse on the twigs and shrubs, or to pick what they can get. It is not here, as in our own country, or as in the north, where during summer the fields, the lanes, and even the roadsides, are profusely clothed with verdure, affording an ample supply of grateful food to the farmer's stock, and where the sleekness of their skins and the plumpness of their forms sufficiently attest their prosperous condition. But here grass is almost unknown; and nothing more strongly marks the distinction between this region and the one I have left, than the almost total absence of that green carpet in the