Clay As Delicacy

Bay of Plenty Beacon, Volume 12, Issue 10, 6 January 1948, Page 3

Clay As Delicacy

There is an old saying that everybody eats a peck of dirt before he dies. This mfiy be true with a grain here and there in our daily diet, but the village of Troy, in South Carolina, has its clay-eating Negroes. They eat this “dirt” daily between meals, and it is said to be an unfailing prescription for stomach troubles. The taste for it is acquired in early childhood, and they eat it without even an accompanying drink of water.

It is of a particular type, carefully selected and clean—as dirt goes. Red in colour and smooth in texture, it has virtually no grains of sand and is chalky to the taste. Around Troy it is plentiful, and enthusiasts locate it by crawling over the ground and sniffing. It is found principally on sloping ground, and when older residents point to level patches they say: “That was a hill when I was a child.” Those hills have been eaten away.

The clay is not a substitute for other foods, although it constitutes a large percentage of each individual’s total consumption; it is eaten rather as a delicacy than for the nourishment which they nevertheless maintain that it contains. Investigation by scientists and missionaries in remote parts of the world have failed to discover any tribes similar to the clay-eaters of Troy.

New Anti-T.B. Drug A new drug, developed from a sample of soil brought from Venezuela and showing promsie in the treatment of tuberculosis, has been reported in “Science Magazine,” official organ of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. The drugf, known as Chloromycetin, may ultimately prove to be a partner of steptomycin, which has already shown good resplts against tuberculosis.