Coca appears to enjoy an undisputed reign in the Cordilleras; no other narcotic starts up to share the throne, and this is almost the only one which has not been imitated, or for which some substitute has not either been proposed or used. The antipodes, or nearly so, of this country possesses a plant, which, had it grown freely in other parts of the world might have been heard of more extensively as an indulgence. In Siberia, however, there seems to be little use made of the small indigenous rhododendron, which claims to be one of the most powerful narcotics in the world. Steller, the Russian botanist, had a tame deer which became so intoxicated by browsing on about ten of its leaves, that, after staggering about for some time, it dropped into a deep but troubled sleep for four hours, after which it awoke, apparently free from pain, but would never touch the leaves again. Steller’s servants, after this, took to intoxicating themselves with the leaves without any evil effects. We have also been informed that certain of the Russians have been charged with the habit of following the example of these experimentalists, by getting drunk upon the leaves, which have been used in infusion, as Pallas states, with good effect in the cure of chronic rheumatism. The flowers of another species of rhododendron are eaten as a narcotic by the Hill people of India, but in these instances the extent of their use is so small, and the persons indulging in them so few, that no claim can be set up for them, except as minor narcotics occasionally employed, when the other and more important substances cannot readily be obtained.
For the basis of much which this chapter contains, we are indebted to the Travels in Bolivia and Peru of that worthy trio of doctors, Pöppig, Weddell, and Tschuddi, besides three times as many more, less noted and less known, but whose information was not less to be relied upon on the points concerning which they have spoken. Whether the votaries of our Lady of Yongas are as numerous as has been asserted, or only of the number we have suggested—whether the influence of this plant over the stomachic regions is sufficient to subdue the pangs of hunger, or allay the cruelties of thirst, or these are only effects due to the imagination—whether it has the marvellous power of softening the adamantine rock, or strengthening and supporting the lungs in the ascent of Andean summits, or whether these, and all of these, are fictions proceeding from the heat-oppressed brain, it is, nevertheless, certain, that a great amount of interest gathers around this plant, which associates itself so intimately with the country in which it flourishes, that, as for centuries past, so for centuries to come, coca will remain the characteristic plant of the Peruvian nation, as tea was, and is, of the Chinese.
[CHAPTER XXII.]
WHITEWASH AND CLAY.
“Alexander died. Alexander was buried. Alexander returneth into dust; the dust is earth: of earth we make loam. And why of that loam, whereto he was converted, might they not stop a beer barrel?”——Hamlet.
The fact, at one time doubted, but now established beyond dispute, that some tribes indulge in the habit of dirt-eating, is one which, from its singularity, claims notice. The Malayan uses lime as an ingredient in compounding his favourite masticatory, and the coquero of the Andes mixes it with his leaves of coca. The Nubians mingle the saline natron with their quid of tobacco, and the blacks of Gesira the same material to compound their “bucca.” The Ottamacs and Omaguas avail themselves of the assistance of shell lime to give pungency to their intoxicating snuffs. The tribes on the coast of Paria, according to Gomara, stimulated the organs of taste by caustic lime, as other races employ tobacco, coca, or betel. In our own days this practice exists among the Guajiros at the mouth of the Rio de la Hacha. Here the still uncivilized Indians carry small shells, calcined and powdered, in a box made from the husk of a fruit. This box is suspended from their girdle, and serves a variety of purposes. The powder used by the Guajiros is an article of commerce, as formerly was that of the Indians of Paria. What could first have induced these people to use by itself, or other races to mingle with vegetable substances, a mineral only known to us as a whitewash, or for somewhat similar vulgar uses, and to metamorphose it into a luxury, is difficult to understand. We comprehend the value of lime when stirred about in a pail, with sufficiency of water to reduce it to the consistence of cream, and then by the aid of a broad flat brush transferred to the ceilings of our dwellings. We cannot so well comprehend or appreciate the luxury of rolling it into a pellet, and transferring it to our mouths, as a whitewash for regions where the curious eye of man does not penetrate.
The residents at the fur-posts on the Mackenzie River, have a mineral in use among them, known by the appellation of white mud, which is used for whitewashing, and, when soap is scarce, it supplies the place of that article for washing clothes. It resembles pipe-clay, and exists in beds from six to twelve inches in thickness. It is of a yellowish white colour, sometimes with a reddish tinge. On the Arkansas also a similar substance has been met with, called pink clay. The clay of the Mackenzie is smooth, and, when masticated, has a flavour, we are told, resembling the kernel of a hazel nut. Sir John Richardson obtained some of this clay in his journey to Prince Rupert’s Land, and had it examined, but could not discover in it any nutritious properties, or detect the remains of infusorial animalculæ, such as are found in other edible clays. The natives of the locality in which this substance is found, eat it in times of scarcity, and suppose that by its use they prolong their lives. There are certain physiological reasons known to us whereby we account for fowls, and other winged bipeds indulging in the singular propensity of swallowing small pebbles, fragments of lime or mortar, sand and clay; but as we cannot apply these same arguments to the cases of other “bipeds without feathers” who indulge in the same propensity, we naturally seek for some signs of nutritious value in the substance itself. In this instance the remote probability of its containing decayed animal matter does not apparently exist, for the microscope detects no infusoria. And unless we argue, as did Hamlet with his friend Horatio, that in this clay are the remains of a previous generation, we can scarce account for its being a good article of food.
“Imperial Cæsar, dead and turned to clay,
Might stop a hole to keep the wind away;”