264 The Commercial Products of the Sea. 



chagrin these skins used to be much employed in Turkey, 

 Syria, Tunis, and Tripoli. That made in Constantinople 

 was considered the best. It was coloured black, green, 

 white, and red. 



Fish Products. — The ingenuity of the Norwegians has 

 discovered a hundred ways of pleasing the palate of the 

 home consumer, and increasing the export of articles 

 derived from the sea. Preserved fish and portions of fish, 

 such as roes and sounds, salmon and lobster patties, or 

 rather pasties or fat^s — for the first word gives an idea of 

 something small, whereas these and other paMs well known 

 on the Continent resemble in size the famous venison 

 pasties of the olden time in England, and are often a yard 

 or more in length ^preserved, mussels, lobsters, prawns, 

 and a dozen other articles, make up altogether a very con- 

 siderable trade. Amongst the most peculiar preparations 

 of Norway, however, are the fish flours — fixrines de poisson, 

 as they are called. They are composed of the flesh of fish 

 reduced to powder, with some additional substances, and 

 the biscuits made from these flours are said by certain 

 chemists to contain four times the nutritive matter of beef, 

 and 16 times that of milk or rye bread. The farine de 

 poisson is also used in place of rice and potatoes ; and the 

 dishes prepared from it are served at Norwegian tables 

 with poultry, and are said to be very palatable. 



Hard, horny pieces of dried bonito, called cummelmums, 

 are rasped over their rice by the Hindoos. Dried loaves of 

 putrid pounded fish are eaten in Africa and South America. 



Fish paste. — A peculiar preparation, called by the 

 Malays balachong and by the Javanese trasi, is a foetid 

 mass, composed chiefly of pounded or bruised fish and 

 shrimps ; this is fermented and dried in the sun. It is 

 largely consumed as a condiment to rice in all the countries 



