Alexandria Gazette

DIRT EATERS.
"A GEORGIA FADDLE"
Pioneer saying.

In many of the southern states you meet a class of people that not only eat dirt—not from a desire to gratify any appetite, but from the relish they have for its peculiar taste! Strange as this may seem, it is nevertheless true, and in speaking of it I am often looked upon as a dealer in the marvelous. I met with a whole family once in Louisiana who adored the luxury of dirt though surrounded with every thing necessary to satisfy nature's fondest call. The appearance of this family, their peculiarity struck me. I questioned the old man upon the nature of his disease, he of course refused me information upon the subject, and I left them under the firm impression of the day they were suffering from severe and repeated attacks of Fever and Ague. In consequence of ignorance of the case and neglect to examine; led away into so strange and unnatural a propensity. Since that time however, I have thought much upon the subject, and had, at least to my own satisfaction, accounted for it most philosophically and was about to give them publicity when the Journal of Humboldt fell into my hands, from which I make the following extracts in corroboration of the fact, more than explanation, of the causes. The fact is however established, that there are such things as Dirt Eaters—one thing, however, differs from Humboldt, which strikes me forcibly, viz.: the preference of its Earthly Epicures; those whom I saw, were lean, sallow, and death-like, and the only tense and stuffed up, the latter in cailion presented a most disgusting appearance, while the face exhibited a death like hue, and the absence of all intellectual expression.

"I observed every where within the torrid zone in a great number of individuals, children, women, and sometimes even full grown men an inordinate and almost irresistible desire of swallowing earth; not an alkaline or calcareous earth, to neutralize (as it is vulgarly said) acid juices, but a fat clay, unctuous, and exhaling a strong smell. It is found necessary to tie the children's hands, or to confine them, to prevent their eating earth, when the rain ceases to fall."

[The author goes to some length into analogies and reasoning, but we confine our quotations principally to facts.]

"The negroes on the coast of Guinea delight in eating a yellow earth, which they change. The slaves who are taken to America to recover from fevers have the same enjoyment; but it is constantly detrimental to their health. They say that the earth of the West Indies is not so easy of digestion as that of their own country. The same clay is said by a planter in Louisiana indulging on the earth, digging the soft clay up with his fingers and stuffing it in his mouth. Sometime after I met him on the Levee in New Orleans, so much improved I scarcely knew him; he could not get his favorite earth."

Humboldt speaks of the Otomacs, a race of Indians in America, as also the inhabitants of New Caledonia in the Pacific Ocean, who "eat it for want, and to appease hunger." This is not true—the propensity is innate, and if roast beef was set before them, earth would have the preference. Would it not be well for some of your scientific readers to examine the subject more freely; my principal reason for noticing the fact is, that universally it is doubted, particularly among our northern brethren.—New Orleans Morning Post.