The mollusca, such as polypi, sepiæ, and loligines, are hard and
indigestible, and particularly the polypi. Their juices are saltish, but
when digested they furnish considerable nourishment to the body.
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COMMENTARY. Galen remarks that the mollusca, or mollia, have no scales,
nor any rough testaceous skin, but a soft one, like that of men. Their
flesh, he says, is hard, indigestible, and contains a small proportion
of saltish juices; but, if digested, it affords no little nourishment
to the body. The sepia, or cuttle-fish, was anciently, and is at
present, much used in Rome as an article of food. Pliny states that it
is laxative. He adds that it is taken in food, boiled with oil, salt,
and barley-meal. Simeon Seth says of it, that it is difficult to digest,
but that, if digested, it affords considerable nourishment to the body,
and engenders crude humours; on which account, it ought to be taken with
acrid condiments, and an old thin wine drunk afterwards. Mnesitheus, as
quoted by Athenæus, says that the flesh of the mollusca is indigestible
and aphrodisiacal.
Apicius directs us to dress them in much the same way as recommended
by Seth; that is to say, he recommends us to add to them spices, hot
aromatics, wine, vinegar, and the like.
The sepia of the ancients was indisputably the _sepia officinalis_ L. or
cuttle-fish; the loligo probably the _loligo parva_ of Rondelet, _Angl._
calamary. The term polypus is vaguely applied, and may comprehend several
species of _hydra_.