332 



The most simple means of employing dead Animals* 



communicated a mortal affection to people who had dissected them.* 

 Thus, then, we should never renounce the use of the flesh of those 

 animals which have died from accident or disease, for the nourish- 

 ment of man, from the fear of being injured by it ; but it often hap- 

 pens that the flesh will be at once tough, soft and distasteful ; in this 

 case, it should still be preserved in the manner stated above, for the 

 nourishment of dogs 3 hogs, and even poultry; if stewed a sufficient 

 length of time, and in a quantity of water nearly equal to that used 

 in boiling, it may be very easily cut up or hashed, and mixed with 

 five or six times the quantity of potatoes, bran, &c. This mixture 

 produces much more profitable nutriment to the domestic animals of 

 which we have just spoken, than if there had been no mixture ; it 

 may be as good for them and more nourishing than the best wheat 

 bread : 'we cannot, therefore, too earnestly advise the inhabitants of 

 the country to avail themselves of their dead animals, excepting 

 only, we repeat, those whose contagious diseases, before described, 

 should be dangerous to the persons engaged in skinning them, and 



* We find, in a memoir published in the year VIII, by M . Huzard, member of 

 the Institute, a great number of facts, conclusive on this head, and from among 

 which we will cite the following. 



During the contagious disease among cattle of 1770, and of the year VI, which 

 had a much more dangerous character than the preceding, the number of beasts 

 sold to the butchers was very great, yet without any of the diseases having been 

 spread among the people. 



The physicians charged with the care of visiting the indigent, (who would have 

 been more exposed, if there had been any real danger from the use of these base 

 viands,) being consulted have only been able to cite examples tending to prove the 

 harmlessness of this food. 



The opening of animals killed in the chase, presents the same pathological phe- 

 nomena, as that of animals who have died of carbuncle. This disease is sometimes, 

 indeed, occasioned by forced and violent marches. 



The use of game, partly putrefied, does not occasion any distemper. 



The chief physicians of the French armies of Sombre and Meuse, Rhine and Mo- 

 selle, of Italy, have witnessed, as M. Huzard has, a great part of their armies nour- 

 ished for a long time on the flesh of beeves and cows, which had died of the distemper 

 which prevailed in the year IV, without any disease resulting to the numerous con- 

 sumers of it. 



Many observations, like those related of the two butchers of the Invalides, cited 

 by M. Huzard, prove that diseases have been contracted, and even that death has 

 supervened, among persons who had skinned animals affected with contagious dis- 

 eases, while none of those who had been fed upon the flesh of these animals had 

 been indisposed. 



The almost general use, among the poor inhabitants of Paris, of the flesh of horses, 

 which died during the famine of the year VII, was not followed by any special af- 

 fection. 



