THE BUTCHER.
1. Man is designed by nature, to subsist on vegetable and animal food. This is obvious, from the structure of his organs of mastication and digestion. It does not follow, however, that animal food is, in all cases, positively required. In some countries, the mass of the people subsist chiefly or entirely on vegetables. This is especially the case in the East Indies, where rice and fruits are the chief articles of food.
2. On the other hand, the people who live in the higher latitudes subsist principally on the flesh of animals. This is preferred, not only because it is better suited to brace the system against the rigours of the climate, but because it is most easily provided. In temperate climates, a due proportion of both animal and vegetable substances is consumed.
3. Although the skins of beasts were used for the purpose of clothing, soon after the fall of man, we have no intimation from the Scriptures, that their flesh, or that of any other animal, was used, until after the flood. The Divine permission was then given to Noah and his posterity, to use, for this purpose, "every moving thing that liveth." But in the law of Moses, delivered several centuries after this period, many exceptions are to be found, which were intended to apply only to the Jewish people. These restrictions were removed, on the introduction of Christianity. The unbelieving Jews, however, still adhere to their ancient law.
4. The doctrine of transmigration has had a great influence in diminishing the consumption of animal food. This absurd notion arose somewhere in Central Asia, and, at a very early period, it spread into Egypt, Greece, Italy, and finally among the remote countries of the ancient world. It is still entertained by the heathen nations of Eastern Asia, by the tribes in the vicinity of Mount Caucasus, and by some of the American savages, and African negroes.
5. The leading feature of this doctrine is, that the souls of departed men reappear on earth in the bodies of animals, both as a punishment for crimes committed during life, and as a means of purification from sin. This dogma was adopted by the Pythagoreans, a sect of Grecian philosophers; and, as a natural consequence, it led them, as it has ever done the votaries of this opinion, to the veneration of animals, and to abstinence from their flesh, lest they might devour that of some of their deceased friends or relatives.
6. People who dwell thinly scattered in the country, rear and slaughter the animals for the supply of their own tables; but, in villages, large towns, and cities, the inhabitants depend chiefly on the butcher for their meat. The animals commonly slaughtered are, sheep, cattle, and hogs.
7. The butchers obtain their animals from the farmers, or from drovers, who make it a business to purchase them in the country, and drive them to market. The farmers near large cities, who have good grazing farms, are accustomed to buy lean cattle, brought from a distance, with a view to fatten them for sale. There are also persons in the cities, who might, with propriety, be called cattle brokers; since they supply the butchers of small capital with a single animal at a time, on a credit of a few days.
8. Every butcher who carries on the business, has a house in which he kills his animals, and prepares them for sale. When it is intended to slaughter an ox, a rope is thrown about his horns or neck, with which he is forced into the slaughter-house, and brought to the floor by the aid of a ring. The butcher then knocks him on the head, cuts his throat, deprives him of his hide, takes out his entrails, washes the inside of his body with water, and cuts him up into quarters. The beef is now ready to be conveyed to the market-house. The process of dressing other quadrupeds varies but little from this in its general details. The cellular substance of mutton, lamb and veal, is often inflated with air, that the meat may appear fat and plump.
9. In large cities and towns, the meat is chiefly sold in the market-house, where each butcher has a stall rented from the corporation. It is carried there in a cart, and cut into suitable pieces with a saw, knife, and a broad iron cleaver.