A good brine is made of 4 lbs. of salt and lb. of saltpetre in 6 pints of water.

It is usual to employ salt and saltpetre when preparing the dried strips of flesh, called charqui in the South American States and tasajo in Nicaragua, for the climate does not allow the meat to be so thoroughly dried in a few hours as to prevent decomposition. The meat selected for this purpose is very lean, and in preparing the food for the table it is essential to use fat of flesh or lard, and to flavour with vegetables, herbs and good gravy.

Salt is also used very generally when preparing dried fish.

Mr. Morgan devised an ingenious process by which the preserving material, composed of water, saltpetre, and salt, with or without flavouring matter, was distributed throughout the animal, and the tissues permeated and charged. His method was exemplified by him at a meeting of the Society of Arts, on April 13, 1854, when I presided, and is described as follows in the Journal of that Society of the preceding March :

A bullock having been killed in the usual way, the chest was immediately opened, and a metal pipe with a stopcock inserted in connection with the arterial system. The pipe was connected, by means of elastic tubing, with a tub filled with brine, placed at an elevation of about twenty feet above the floor. The stopcock being turned, the brine forced itself through the arteries of the animal and passing through the capillaries flowed back through the veins carrying with it all the blood, making its exit by means of an incision provided for that purpose. About six gallons of brine passed thus through the body, washing out all the blood from the vessels. Having thus cleared all the vessels, the metal pipe was connected with another tub similarly placed,

containing the preservative materials to be injected, and at the same time their exit after traversing the body was prevented. On communication being made, the liquid became forced into the vessels, and by means of the pressure it penetrated into every part of the animal.' Much of it proceeded through the minute vessels, called the capillaries, into the veins, but a considerable proportion exuded through the sides of the blood-vessels, and escaped into the cavities of the body and the surrounding tissues. The whole body was thus an incorporation of flesh and brine, and the operation was complete in a few minutes. After a short time, the carcass could be cut up into joints and packed for exportation.

4

The preservative material which he recommended was 1 gallon of brine, to lb. of sugar, oz. of monophosphoric acid, a little spice and sauce to each cwt. of flesh.

The process was ingenious and sound in theory, and the preservation of the meat was complete when no untoward event occurred, but it failed in certain instances. When performed in this country it was used chiefly to preserve meat for the Navy, and not for home consumption; but there is no difficulty in employing the method in foreign meat-growing countries for the use of any people wishing to eat salt meat.

Salted meat has, however, several defects which will always prevent its general use whenever fresh meat can be obtained.

1. The salt extracts a considerable quantity of the juices, and by so much lessens the nutritive value and natural flavour of the meat, and as these extracted juices are obtained only when mixed with salt they cannot be used as food. The flesh is harder than

cooked fresh meat, in proportion to the strength of the saline solution and the duration of the application of it. This is particularly the case with the meat which is both salted and dried, so that after having been prepared for some months it cannot be rendered soft by any amount of soaking in water and skill of cooking. The spasmodic attempts which were made to introduce charqui into common use entirely failed for this reason. This is, however, comparatively slight when the meat is highly salted and intended for early use, and, with subsequent judicious immersion in water and cooking, nearly all the hardness may be removed.

2. The flavour differs very greatly from that of cooked meat, and although when used occasionally it is agreeable, it is not preferred to fresh meat as a regular article of diet.

3. The introduction into the system of so much salt is prejudicial to health, whether by lessening the relish for food or inducing a craving for fluids, indigestion, or skin disease.

4. The capability to nourish the system is lessened by the various effects now mentioned, and a given weight of salted meat is not equal in nutritive value to that of fresh boiled meat with the meat liquid added, or to fresh roasted meat.

Hence it is not desirable to extend the operations of preserving meat by this process, provided a sufficient supply of meat can be obtained, whether preserved or otherwise, in its fresh state, and commercial and scientific men should be encouraged to improve the method by which meat may be preserved unsalted.

It is still the practice to salt or pickle beef and other kinds of meat for the year's supply in Anglesea and in

the Highlands of Scotland, and the animals being killed in the cold weather, the meat takes the salt readily, but it is a less prevalent practice than formerly. It is called mairt in Scotland to signify Michaelmas timethe period when it is prepared.

G.-BY PRESSURE.

The River Plate, and also the Texan Pressure Meat Preserving Companies, have adopted Henley's process of meat preserving, by which the meat is cut into thin slices and subjected to pressure, which causes much of the juice and fat to be removed from the meat, and the meat and juices are treated and preserved separately. It remains to be seen whether meat with the juices pressed out of it can be sold, or will be valuable as food. It will not be meat in the ordinary sense of the word.

CHAPTER III.

BONE.

THE value of bones as food is not a recent discovery, since the knuckle bones of veal and the marrow of marrow bones have long been in request, but it is only of late years that a proper estimate has been made of the nutritive material, which by a careful process may be extracted from them.

Bones consist principally of two substances, viz., gelatin, which may be obtained by immersing them in weak muriatic acid, and mineral matter which may be separated by burning the gelatin, and so great is the proportion of each, that the form of the bone is still retained when either is taken away.

The following is the chemical composition of dry ox-bones, in 100 parts:

Hence one-third of the weight of dry bone consists of nitrogenous matter, which when extracted could be used as food. This is a much larger proportion than is found in fresh bread or meat.

But besides these elements, there are others in fresh bones which are of great value in nutrition. Such are oil, nitrogenous juices, and flavouring matters which vary with the kind of bone.

Bones consist of three parts which require notice as foods. The solid shaft, as of the long marrow bones, the cellular structure of the flat bones, and the cartilaginous ends of the bones at the joints.

The solid shaft cannot be used as food by the process of boiling, since it does not disintegrate by that agency, and in order to extract the gelatin, it is desirable to grind the bone before boiling it. The marrow is, however, very valuable both as a fat and for its agreeable flavour, and may be roughly reckoned as equal in nutriment to half of its weight of butter. The cancellated bones may be first roughly broken and then disintegrated by digestion in a closed vessel with hot water for twelve to twenty-four hours. The cells contain fluid which consists of water, fat, and nitrogenous and flavouring matters, which are valuable and agreeable additions to foods, so that this class of bones. is the most valuable for food.