Note 39 — Chapter I · Why I went to Great Salt Lake City.—The various Routes.—The Line of Country traversed.—Diaries and Disquisitions. (continued 2)

There is another kind of cactus called by the whites “whisky-root,” and by the Indian “peioke,” used like the intoxicating mushroom of Siberia. “It grows in Southern Texas, in the range of sand-hills bordering on the Rio Grande, and in gravelly, sandy soil. The Indians eat it for its exhilarating effect on the system, producing precisely the same excitement as alcoholic drinks. It is sliced as you would a cucumber; the small piece is chewed and swallowed, and in about the same time as comfortably tight cocktails would ‘stir the divinity within’ you, this indicates itself; only its effects are what I might term a little k-a-v-o-r-t-i-n-g, giving rather a wilder scope to the imagination and actions.”—(A Correspondent of the New Orleans Picayune, quoted by Mr. Bartlett.)