NATURE 



157 



THURSDAY, JUNE 28, 1877 



SOLDIERS ' RA TTONS 



THAT Soldiers' Rations are not without influence upon 

 a campaign no one will dispute. It is not enough 

 to have murderous weapons and big battalions to insure 

 conquest nowadays, and in the last two little wars'in which 

 this country engaged these were indeed of secondary im- 

 portance. The Abyssinian campaign, when our troops 

 marched nearly four hundred miles across a rugged and 

 unknown country, has been justly termed a victory of engi- 

 neering, while the Gold Coast expedition, by reason of the 

 efficient sanitary arrangements which reduced to a mini- 

 mum the deadly effects of a terrible climate, may be fitly 

 called a doctor's war. No doubt in the case of European 

 struggles, far more depends upon the purely military ele- 

 ment ; but if the Prussian needle-gim contributed in a 

 great measure to the defeat of the Austrians at Sadowa, 

 it is none the less true that the famous Eii's^vurst, or pea- 

 sausage, of the Germans had much to do with their 

 maintaining the siege of Paris during the long cold winter 

 months of that capital's investment. 



It is a little difficult to institute comparison between 

 the nutritive qualities of the rations served out to soldiers 

 in various countries. A soldier in the field, whether 

 marching or fighting, must put forth more muscular 

 energy than in times of peace, and according to 

 Dr. Parkes and other authorities, it is the nitrogen 

 in his food, more than anything else, that is neces- 

 sary to the activity of the muscle, and this is required 

 in greater quantity in proportion to the increase of work. 

 That hard labour can be performed for some time without 

 any increase of nitrogenous diet is true no doubt, but in 

 this case it is at the expense of the nitrogenous consti- 

 tuents of other parts of the body, in the neighbourhood of 

 the muscle, and it would be impossible for a man to con- 

 tinue such labour for any length of time. Whether the 

 nitrogenous matter he assimilates is contained in meat 

 or bread seems to be a matter of little import. An English 

 soldier who gets a three quarters of a pound ration of 

 meat daily is said to be no better off, as regards the 

 nutritive character of his diet, than a German soldier, 

 whose staple food is rye bread, and this one can well 

 believe, looking at the constituents of the two food-stufifs. 

 Meat from a lean animal, contains but I2'S per cent, of 

 nitrogenous matter, whereas samples of rye which have 

 been analysed, have been found to contain as much 

 actually as 15 "8 of the same body. Moreover, the amount 

 of water in a pound of meat and a pound of bread is a 

 matter that must not be overlooked, for while in the 

 former it amounts to 57 per cent., in the latter case 

 it is only about 40. As, too, a loaf of bread consti- 

 tutes of itself a very perfect diet, the starch and fat 

 it contains supplying the calorifiant or heat-producing 

 matter necessary in animal food, we may assume that 

 troops fed upon good bread are as well off as those 

 supplied with more costly rations. At the same 

 time it cannot be denied that different climates and 

 different conditions have a vast influence upon dietary, 

 and while British soldiers require a goodly allowance of 

 meat to sustain their energy, the Turk rarely tastes such 

 Vol. XVI. — No. 400 



food from one week to another. In fact, in the Moslem 

 soldier we have the most easily satisfied of beings, so far 

 as the commissariat is concerned. He does not even 

 require bread, but will fight for weeks and months 

 together upon rations of meal or bruised Indian corn, 

 which serves him indifferently for breakfast, dinner, and 

 supper. The Russian has rather better food, although 

 from our point of view his fare may appear frugal enough. 

 Two pounds of black bread and a quarter of a pound of 

 fresh meat, or bacon in lieu thereof, with garlic, salt, and 

 plenty of tea, seem to be the daily rations of the Czar's 

 soldiers, though a coarse sweet bean, known in this 

 country as the locust bean (Johannisbrod), is occasionally, 

 also employed as food. There is no knowing what the com- 

 position of Russian bread is, but assuming it to be for the 

 most part of rye or Indian corn, there should be little 

 difference between the nutritive qualities of the rations ot 

 the Turks and Russians, supposing, that is, the soldiers in 

 both cases receive pretty well as much as they can eat. 

 There is enough nitrogenous matter to make muscle 

 and bone, as well as sugar and starch, or non-nitro- 

 genous bodies to supply animal heat and to support 

 the respiratory organs. Taking milk as the most per- 

 fect food we have for our standard, which may be 

 said to be made up of nitrogenous matter, oil, and 

 sugar, we find that the proportion of nutritive, to heat- 

 producing, or calorifiant, matter, is as one to two. Beans 

 and peas come next in order to milk, the pioportion here 

 being as one to three, while in oatmeal it is as one to five, 

 and in rye, wheat, Indian corn, <S:c., as one to seven or 

 eight. Thus the Turk and the Russian being fed mainly 

 upon rye and Indian corn derive equal benefit from their 

 rations, although the Muscovite soldier gets additional 

 energy, no doubt, from the small ration of meat allowed 

 him. 



The highly nutritive character of pea-flour at once 

 points to the raison d'etre of the pea-sausage of the 

 scientific German soldier. This newly-invented food- 

 stuff consists, as our readers probably know, of peamea 

 and bacon fat, suitably seasoned, and pressed into skins 

 and boiled. The ordinary daily ration of a German 

 soldier is 2 lb. of rye bread and a dinner of soup, which 

 sometimes has a piece of meat floating in it, but generally 

 does not ; this, together with a scanty stipend, which 

 barely suffices to buy him a cup of coffee in the morning 

 and a herring, or salted cucumber, to eke out his bread 

 with, constitutes the whole of his allowances. In the last 

 European war, these comestibles were replaced during 

 some portion of the campaign by the Erbsuiiirs/, and 

 there cannot be a doubt that the health of the Teuton 

 army was improved by a regular and sufficient supply of 

 this suitable food, while at the same time it greatly sim- 

 plified the commissariat service of the invaders. Butchers, 

 bakers, army ovens, and cooking pontoons were for a 

 while dispensed with, and thus it was possible for corps 

 and regiments to move, when necessary, without a great 

 deal of impedimenta. Moreover, as we have seen, the 

 pea-flour gave that extra nutrition which troops subject to 

 unusual exertion, coupled with exposure to cold and frost 

 required. To the Enghsh palate the pea-sausage had 

 an unmistakable taste of tallow, and there is no doubt 

 that all kinds of fat and grease were employed in its pro- 

 duction when the supplies of bacon run short. Animal 



