PRESERVATION OF FISHERY PRODUCTS FOR FOOD. 
551 
ebullitiou. Sucli extracts will keep for a very long time, and tliey are available for all the purposes 
for wlilcb meat extract is available. The question bas still to be tested dietetically wlietber such 
extracts are in any way superior to tbo.se of meat. In any case they are quite e(jual to meat extracts 
in stimulating and restorative properties. 
Sucb extracts, however, can also be made from other marine animals, c. g., crabs and shellfish 
generally. In these cases the extract is so made that it retains the flavor of the crab or shellfish. 
Thus there may be manufactured on the spot a large amount of extract which undoubtedly has a 
commercial and dietetic value. In a properly adjusted dietary, however, mere stimulants and restora- 
tives are not sufficient, but there must be a proper amount and adjustment of the proteids (albumins) 
carbohydrates (such as starches .and sugars), fats, and mineral salts. The qiiestion arises, then. Can 
not a cheap and useful food be made so as to combine these substances in proper inoportion? The 
whole order of the legume tribe, represented by peas, beans, and lentils, have a high dietetic value, 
.and this fact was made use of by the Germans in the manufacture of the famous “ Erbswurst,” or " iron 
ration,” which played so prominent a part in the dietary of the Prus.sian soldiers during the Fr.anco- 
German war. 
As a matter of fact, in most soups what one obtains is really the extractives and salts and some 
flavoring materials. The substances in meat which give rise to the sensations of flavor and sapidity 
are really most important from a physiological point of view, for they excite powerfully the secretion 
of the digestive juices, and this gr^iatly aids the process of digestion. Hence the value of mixing even 
highly nutritious food with sapid articles. Every one is familiar with the fact that tasteless articles 
very soon pall on one’s palate, and how nauseating they become after a time. (Fourth Annual Report 
of the Fishery Board for Scotland, pp. 257, 258.) 
Witli a view to producing a more digestible and- nutritious as well as a more 
economical article of food than the dried cod of commerce, L. M. Haskins, of Boston, 
Mass., introduced in 1881 a combination of fish flesh, bone, and salt, ground together 
and desiccated. His process of manufacture was as follows: 
The edible composition consists of fish bone and fish flesh ground together with common salt in 
a mill or between grinding rolls, so as to be reduced to a powdered state and thoroughly mixed or 
combined. Sixty pounds of the flesh, 20 pounds of the bone, and salt sufficient to give the mixture 
the requisite savor and preserve it from decay under ordinary circumstances are found to afford in a 
ground state an excellent edible composition. The proportions of the ingredients of the composi- 
tion may, however, bo varied, as occasion may require, to produce a palatable and suitable article 
of food.* 
The inventor claims that this composition, by containing the alkaline and gelatinous i)roperties 
of the bone in a powdered state, is not only readily digestible, and, from a sanitary point of view, better 
as an article of food than salted fish without any o.sseous additions, but that it can be manufactured 
and sold at a cheaper rate comparatively. It is well known that wheat or other flour without the 
admixture of the bran is not so digestible or beneficial as food as it is with a due amount of the bran, 
the latter containing the constituents necessary to the formation of bone. So this composition, by 
containing osseous elements in a finely reduced state, is rendered thereby not only easier digested but 
better as a food, esi)ecially when suitably cooked. 
The following method of preparing fisli meal was introduced by F. B. Nichols 
and Oathcart Thomson, of Halifax, Nova Scotia, and patented May 1, 1883: 
The fish are headed and split and a portion of the backbone is removed in the same manner as for 
making the ordinary dry-salted fish. The pieces are then washed and all bloody portions removed. 
Very little salt should, it is said, be used in curing, as heavy salting makes an inferior meal, even 
when the excess is removed by water previous to drying. For some qualities of meal it is preferred 
to dry without salt. In this state the fish would soon spoil and very rapid drying must be resorted to 
in order to save them. The immediate application of currents of hot air would accomplish this, but 
would render the skin so friable <as to defeat the after process and in other respects injure it for making 
meal, and open-air drying would not be speedy enough to keep the fish from tainting. In order to 
obviate these difficulties the fish-drying house and apparatus of the patent granted this inventor 
Letters Patent No. 241357, dated May 10, 1881. 
