Page:Letters from the Battle-fields of Paraguay (1870).djvu/223



VISIT TO GENEKAL UllQUlZA. 193

Professor Barou Justus von Liebig. It is a kind of liquid sirloiu, which makes a manner of beef-tea " much im- proved/' says the advertisement, " by the addition of a little fresh butter, a slice of hot or cold ham, beef, or mutton, with spices according to taste." This recipe, which makes it an assistant to itself, reminds me of the Irish recipe for making " stone soup" â€” boiling water, with meat and vegetables ad libitum. I tried Extractum Carnis, and found it detestable, gluey, empyreumatic, with an inde- scribable unzest like that of over-toasted bread. In large doses it poisons, as does nicotine, and at best it is fit only for thickening. But " simple processes for the preservation of meat" seem almost as simple as making diamonds, or as permuting base metal to gold. So all fortune to ye who would supply fresh meat for the roast beef of Old England. Steam your stuff into cakes, D. Carlos Lix! Compress hydraulically Messrs. Muiioz and Company! Inject Chlo- ride of Sodium into the aorta, Messrs. Morgan and Oliden, versus Messrs. Medlock and Bayly, cum Dr. Kernot with bisulphide of calcium! Deal mysteriously with charqui by dark processes Messrs. de Maria and Ariza, Messrs. Lermitte and Biraben! Smoke dry, Mr. Wilhelm Miiller, your " moot'n 'awms!" Though results be as yet next door to " nil," I will suggest nil desperandum. When you shall feed your cattle with oil-cake and pressed aUalfa^ instead of killing it when fresh from poor grass, fibreless and over- heated by long driving, man shall in the length of time achieve conserves of beef. As yet, however, I prefer to '^ Ext. Car." a glass of the smallest beer.

Before turning in we studied for a while the fair features of the River Uruguay, also known, as the River of the Missions. The name is translated by some stream of the Cachuelas or Rapids, by others w^ater of the Uru bird â€” the Charrua name of an aquatic. Every river, like every

13