WAR BREAD AND ITS CONSTITUENTS 21 



cortical parts of the wheat grain darkens the colour 

 of the loaf, and the presence of other materials alters 

 its texture, and may also alter its colour. 



We as a nation have never been willing to eat what 

 is held to be inferior bread. The black breads (rye 

 breads) which were long the familiar food of the 

 peasants of Europe were always anathema to us. It 

 is most interesting, indeed, to learn from a passage 

 in Lan gland's Piers Ploimnan that even in the four- 

 teenth century the English poor would " eat no bread 

 that beans came in'\ They demanded "clean wheat" ! 

 No blame attaches to their descendants for displaying 

 similar healthy instincts; but it is right at the present 

 time to bring an open mind to the question as to what 

 constitutes actual inferiority in bread. Is the very 

 white wheaten loaf so superior to every other type of 

 bread that the public welfare must necessarily suffer 

 by its replacement? This question should to-day be 

 approached, and, if possible, answered without pre- 

 judice. 



In an endeavour to supply an answer it will be 

 worth while to consider, first of all, certain points of 

 general interest connected with the cereals, the group 

 of plants to which wheat belongs. 



The cereals are only grasses, but they are grasses 

 distinguished from the majority of their kind by the 

 fact that they store up in their seeds a relatively large 

 amount of nutriment for the growth of the succeeding 

 generation nutriment in a concentrated form which 

 happens to be highly suited to the needs of man and 

 animals. 



At what stage human selection and effort began to 

 play a part in encouraging this desirable quality in 

 members of the grass tribe we do not know. The 

 origin of the cultivated cereals is strangely veiled in 

 obscurity. We know, however, that certain of them 



