154 FIRST FORMS OF VEGETATION. 
land, however, the inhabitants remove this dis- 
agreeable quality by a very simple process. They 
first chop it to pieces, and macerate it for several 
days in water mixed with salt of tartar or quick- 
lime, which it absorbs very freely ; it is then dried 
and reduced to powder, and mixed with the flour 
of the common knot-grass, made into a cake or 
boiled, and eaten with rein-deer’s milk, and eaten 
with relish too, by these poor people, who confess, 
with a most simple and affecting gratitude, that 
‘a bountiful Providence sends them bread out of 
the very stones. The powder is not unlike starch 
in appearance, and possesses some of its properties, 
for it swells in boiling water, and becomes, on 
cooling, a fine jelly, which soon hardens into a 
tough, transparent substance very pleasant to the 
taste, especially when flavoured with sugar, milk, 
a little white wine, or aromatics. It is frequently 
used for making blanc-mange in this country, for 
which purpose it is said to be equal, if not superior, 
to Irish moss or the finest isinglass. The bitter 
principle is often employed for brewing, and in the 
composition of ship-biscuit, to prevent the attack 
of worms. It also forms an ingredient of a well- 
known form of cocoa called ‘Iceland-moss Cocoa,’ 
as well as of a French confection known as ‘Pate 
de Lichen.’ It may be mentioned that notwith- 
standing its name, the Iceland-moss is not only 
