BIRDS' NESTS FOR SOUP.
BY RALPH WATSON.
One pleasant morning in the early part of last April I had just landed in Macao. Having no idea that I was acquainted with any person in Asia, you can imagine that I was not a little surprised to hear an exultant shout burst forth behind me, and the familiar old college cry. "Rah! rah! rah! Y—a—l—e! 26 South College, or there is no faith in the blue! Well, Well, if this isn't glorious!"
With the first sound a hand came down vigorously on my shoulder, swinging me around in a way that reminded me of past experiences, and lo! Jack Merriman had hold of me in earnest.
"What a splendid fellow you have grown to be, Tom!—six feet, if you are an inch. Look at me—five feet six; never could amount to anything, you know."
"But how come you here, Jack? What are you doing?"
"In tea, my boy, in tea. And not a bad thing, now, tea is, when you take it in the right way. But for yourself—whence and whither bound?"
"From London last, by Suez, Bombay, and Calcutta; to Canton to-morrow, and then up the coast."
"Very good; then we will make the most of our time to-day. Here we are at my office, and this is, of course, your head-quarters. Three o'clock now. I'll just send around and tell old Man Lok to be ready for us, for I am going to give you something you never had—a regular Chinese dinner. The old fellow has some of the best nests I have seen in months, and you shall have trial of the same. Would you like a few fins too, or perhaps a pacu-qui? But I forget; you are not yet up in our style of rations. Never mind; I will show you what we can do."
The rest of the afternoon Jack and I talked about old times. Then we repaired to the restaurant, which he told me was noted for the excellence of Chinese dishes served up in their own peculiar style.
"Up to the chopsticks, Tom? I suppose not, and we must make allowance for you. Man Lok has doubtless provided, for I told him you were a poor Mellican man who did not know much yet. He will have a knife and fork for you."
On the table at my place were a knife and fork, as Jack had promised; at his were the chopsticks, the use of which was a mystery to me then, though subsequently I became expert in managing them. The dinner was a most elaborate one, course succeeding course in great number and variety, all very elegantly served. Many of them were such articles of food as I had never seen, and as to the nature of some I could not even hazard a guess. But I will not describe them at present, excepting a single one.
This was a soup, which made its appearance at, I think, the fifth course. It was rather thick, and having a decidedly gelatinous look and feeling, it might almost have been called a diluted jelly rather than a soup. It was served very hot, and the flavor was excellent. With it were brought small dishes of very peculiar preserves, which I thought the most delicious things in their way that I had ever tasted. Jack said nothing until some little progress had been made with the soup.
"How do you like it, my boy? A twang of Asia clear through, is not there? Recalls all your memories of Lalla Rookh and Sindbad the Sailor, and those other worthies of ancient history, eh?"
"It is certainly delightful," said I; "unlike anything I ever tasted."
"I should think it might be. Precious little of it you ever see outside the Flowery Land. And what is more, there is not, as I believe, another man even in all China who can match old Man Lok in serving it. This is the famous bird's-nest soup, about as much a peculiarity and a glory of China as the Great Wall, and I was determined that you should make your acquaintance with it under the auspices of Man Lok, the great high-priest, the Soyer, of bird's nest."
"But what is it, Jack? What are you talking about? How can you eat grass, and sticks, and feathers, and leaves, to say nothing of mud? for those make up birds' nests in general. I must say I never heard of their being used for food."
"Well done, old fellow! Hurrah for Yale! Here is education for you!—a graduate of high standing who never even heard of bird's-nest soup. Why, Tom, you are all adrift, man. I learned more than that in the course of my college life, though I did graduate in the second term of Sophomore year. But I see how it was; classics, mathematics, and boating were all you studied, instead of taking to something useful."
"All right, Jack, I acknowledge your wisdom; only I wish it would enlighten my ignorance."
"So I will, Tom—so I will; but we will wait till evening, and do it at my lodgings, for I have some of the nests there, as well as the birds which build them, and you shall see for yourself. For the present we will do honor to Man Lok." Full honor was done to Man Lok, and evening found me in Jack's rooms.
"Now, Tom, if you will sit down and behave yourself properly, I will give you a practical lecture on ornithology viewed as a science which relates to soup. And that we may start right, I will show you in the first place the origin of the soup."
As he spoke, Jack opened a drawer, from which he took five or six stuffed skins of small dark-colored birds, and after them three curious-looking objects, which he gravely placed on the table before me by the side of the skins. These queer things were irregularly circular, rather broader than my hand, an inch and a half or two inches thick on one side, thinning out almost to an edge on the opposite side. The thickened side was flat, as though it had been formed against some hard substance, from which it had been subsequently torn away.
The one which Jack had placed nearest my hand was dark and dirty, had feathers and filth of all kinds mixed in with its upper surface, and as, like the others, it was sufficiently hollowed out above for such a purpose. I could easily see that it might have been a nest in which a brood of young birds had been hatched and reared. The one next to it was cleaner, free from feathers, and showed no signs of having been used as a nest; but it was of a dingy brown color, and looked generally dirty. The third, however, was really beautiful. It was clean, clear as though its fibres were of pure gelatine, and so brilliant that it looked almost white.
"What in the world are these things?"
"Soup," said Jack, with great gravity—"undeveloped soup."
"Do, for pity's sake, talk sense, Jack. Do you mean to tell me that I have been eating such stuff as this?" pointing to the one nearest me.
"Such are not my intentions. You dined, I think, at the establishment of my friend Man Lok, and that sort of article never comes under his hand. This light one is like what you caused to become part of you, and I believe that even your prejudiced appetite can not fail to admit that it was good. But come, Tom, let's commence with the birds, and we will take up the nests afterward. Look at this little fellow, now; dull-colored beggar, is not he? Do you recognize him? Or rather did you ever know any bird which he resembles?"
"No, none that I can remember."
"Look again. Would he look natural whirling down into a chimney just at evening?"
"What! Do you mean a chimney-swallow, Jack?"
"That is precisely what I mean. Yes, Tom, these nests, which are such a peculiar delicacy to Chinese palates, are all made by swallows, and there are, as far as I can trace them, four species which build nests of this sort. They belong to a division of the swallows which are sometimes called swifts, our common chimney-swallow of the United States being included among the swifts. Those which build the edible nests are found only on the islands of this Asiatic region, and mostly on the coasts of the islands, though sometimes they go forty or fifty miles inland. They are all of one genus, Collocalia, and this one in my hand, which I shot myself, is the Collocalia fuciphaga.
"Four years ago I made a run down to the north coast of Java, and it was there I obtained these, the nests and the birds. The coast on that part of the island is very rocky, and large caves exist in some places, penetrating the rocks quite deeply. I knew that these caves were said to be specially frequented by the swallows, and I found that the report was true, for I visited five or six of them. The birds were very abundant, and I had opportunity to see their nests in every stage of their history. I brought away these three as fair representatives. You can see how they were placed, and this engraving gives you a correct idea of it. They were actually stuck against the perpendicular or sloping wall of rock, precisely as a chimney-swallow sticks his nest against the side of a chimney, his, however, consisting only of a worthless mass of twigs. The Chinamen gather them from these places in boat-loads, and bring them to market. Most of those which are brought here come, I think, from Java and Borneo, though a good supply is obtained also in Ceylon, the species which is found there being the Collocalia nidifica. The nests, however, of the different species are sold together, the only distinction being in quality as to cleanness and color.
"Of course the value of the nests, as with all other goods, depends upon the quality. This dirty fellow here, which has evidently done its work, and furnished board and lodging to a rising family, is of small value; and yet even such as these Chinese patience and ingenuity can clean and clear so perfectly that they are fit for use, though never becoming of first class. This next one had not been used for rearing a brood, but it was soiled in some way in the building, and is of about middle grade. But this is what we call a prime article, this light one, and the whiter it is the better price it commands. The best are worth more than their weight in silver."
"But of what do the birds build them, Jack? Where do they get any such material? It is a strange-looking substance."
"No more strange than honey, Tom, and made in the same way. It used to be thought that it was something which the birds gathered from the surface of the sea, but we know now that that is all foolishness. I saw the swallows catching flies as industriously as I ever watched the barn-swallows doing it over the Green in New Haven, and I opened the stomachs of many specimens which I shot, and found them always filled with insects, and with nothing else, so that we know that their food is the same as that of other birds of their tribe.
"But they have a set of glands, corresponding to the salivary glands at the sides of the mouth, which form this peculiar gelatinous material used by them in building their nests. You know the song says, 'Little by little the bird builds its best,' and that is the way they deposit these fine fibres. When first placed they are always clear and nearly white, and of course nests gathered in that condition are highly prized; few, however, are obtained that have not been more or less soiled. I do not understand the mystery of Man Lok's art, but I know that bird's-nest soup is made very much as any other form of such material—say isinglass or gelatine—would be prepared for the table."