ccxlv 



off Bourbon and the Mauritius. The frog or puff fishes, Tetrodons, are 

 generally reputed to be poisonous, and are rejected as an article of diet 

 by the people of India, but they are highly relished by the Andamanese, 

 and the native doctors in Malabar use them as medicine in phthisical 

 cases. In Burma, where the large yellow Xenopterus naritus is found 

 in all the branches of the Irawaddi, the natives bait for them with small 

 fish, and consider their flesh as good for eating. However, at the Cape of 

 Good Hope a spotted Tetrodon has caused so many deaths, that the officers 

 of all ships anchoring there are warned against their being used as food. 

 In the Nile, one species is reputed to be very poisonous if eaten. In 

 Japan is found a sort which is used for the purpose of effecting suicide, 

 whilst an edict exists in the army of that country, declaring that, should 

 any soldier die from eating it, his son is prohibited from entering the 

 military service. 



425. Sharks, saw-fishes, rays and skates, with the exception of the 



torpedo, are esteemed as food by many of the 

 Cart.lag.nou3 fishes as food. M ^ rasgees and the Seedees fa/Bomliy. In 



Bengal, however, they are rejected by all but the very poorest, some 

 of whom even will refuse them. 



426. Many diseases have been attributed to the effects of a fish 



diet. In Bergen, " fish is perhaps more 

 ^Diseases attributed to a fish largely uged Rg an acti(jle of diet than ^ any 



other part of the world. * * * There 



are two large hospitals devoted exclusively to the treatment of patients 

 suffering from a peculiar form of disease, brought on by eating badly 

 cured fish : the disease is a mixture of leprosy and elephantiasis/'' (Lancet, 

 July 1866, p. 83). " A scorbutic taint is considered to ensue in some 

 portions of Europe from a fish diet. Leprosy in the south of Spain 

 is ascribed to this cause." Amongst the Norwegians, phthisis is 

 common and also struma. " Of fresh meat the Norwegians, get but 

 little, and their fish and milk are often used in a state of partial decom- 

 position instead of fresh, * * Their constitution could ralty and 

 get well on a regimen under which an Englishman would sink/'' (Medical 

 Times and Gazette, July 1869). Examining the foregoing statements, one 

 observes that it is not a good fish diet which is accused of producing 

 leprosy, elephantiasis, scurvy and skin diseases, but fish consumed in a state 

 of putrefaction or badly cured ; but even this may be open to argument. 

 Natives in some portions of Asia consider that eating fish predisposes to 

 cholera, and many object on that account to its use during epidemics 

 of that malady (see ante-paragraph 420 on the Silurida). Leprosy is a 

 well-marked disease, and has been attributed to an unwholesome fish diet. 

 Leprosy is by no means unfrequent in the Panjab, North-West Provinces, 

 and other districts far inland, amongst people who resolutely refuse ever 

 to eat salt-fish however prepared. The only way in which they consume 

 putrid fish is purchasing the fry during the rainy months, which, prior to 

 being cooked, generally is in a more or less putrid condition. But if we 

 go a little further to the east, we find the Burmese race, who most 

 assuredly are a fish-consuming one (see para. 366) and prefer their 

 odoriferous nga-pee to fresh fish. In my travels through Burma, I 

 never saw a single instance of leprosy amongst the indigenous population, 

 nor a case of those congenital malformation of the fingers and toes, so 



