Report on the Means of Supplying the Poor with Food, 37 



point is not how to excite an appetite, but how to satiate it in the 

 cheapest and most substantial manner. Papin was the first individual 

 who introduced the method of preparing food from bones — by expos- 

 ing them to the action of water and steam, under pressure, in his 

 digester. By this means a greater quantity of gelatin, or animal 

 matter of the bone was dissolved than could be procured by simply 

 boiling bones in water, at tlie ordinary temperature of the atmosphere. 

 This mode was afterwards applied to the supply of nourishment to 

 the poor by the D*Arcets, who both engaged in the attempt with most 

 laudible enthusiasm. According to the younger D'Arcet, when the 

 bones of four oxen are properly exhausted, a fifth is in reality created. 

 A metliod was introduced at some of the hospitals in Paris, for ex- 

 tracting gelatin from bones, at the suggestion of D'Arcet. At the 

 Hotel Dieu, bones which have been previously twice boiled — once in 

 the morning to make common soup, and again in the evening to make 

 bouillon maigre, are deprived of their cartilages and fibrous cartilages. 

 They are broken, and placed in iron cylinders, and are exposed for 

 four days to the action of steam, raised to the temperature of 219° to 

 22P Fahr. 



This gelatinous liquid contains in 88 gallons, 

 11*79 Troy lbs. of gelatin. 

 This is then employed to form a broth, by adding a certain quantity 

 of soup made with meat and vegetables. The evidence of those who 

 have examined this compound soup, is highly unfavourable. The 

 gelatinous liquid when taken out of the iron cylinders is highly dis- 

 agreeable, and even excites nausea. The odour becomes less unpleasant 

 after the liquid has stood for some time. This improvement in the smell 

 appears to depend in some measure, upon the escape of ammonia, 

 which has been generated by the strong heat and prolonged action of 

 the steam. It likewise imparts its impairing properties to the soup 

 made from the meat, and causes a truly disgusting odour, {une saveur 

 un veritable degout.) 



We think that these facts are sufficiently condemnatory of the pro- 

 cess of extracting gelatin under long continued pressure from bones, 

 and may receive some degree of explanation from a specimem which 

 we have examined of the tusk of an elephant; in which, probably, by 

 the action of hot sand and pressure, the tusk is seen in tlie act of being 

 gradually converted into a mass of glue, retaining the original figure 

 of the tusk. So that, instead of being obscured under the title of 

 solution of gelatin, perhaps, the true nature of the French soup for 

 the poor, would be better expressed by the title of glue-soup. Indeed, 

 this is put beyond mere surmise, by the fact stated by the French 

 commission, that the solution of gelatin when evaporated left a 

 hard extract presenting the characters of Flanders glue. 



We think it possible, however, that a gelatinous solution might bo 

 obtained from bones, by high pressure steam, if desirable, without its 



