284 SCIENCE PROGRESS 



supplied with an article different in quality from that which they 

 believe they are receiving. 



It is a moot question what a baker expects when he buys 

 flour largely on its colour. Obviously the loaf he makes must 

 be a satisfactory one — large, well-risen, white and of good 

 flavour; moreover, the number obtained from the sack of 

 flour must be up to the average. This implies that the flour 

 gives a proper dough and is generally satisfactory. If his 

 anticipations are so far realised, the baker will have no cause 

 for complaint. What is the result if the flour he has bought 

 has been bleached ? There is no evidence to prove that it will 

 behave abnormally in doughing or fail to give the usual number 

 of satisfactory loaves of the popular degree of whiteness; all that 

 has happened then is that he has paid a little more for the flour 

 on account of its whiteness than he would have paid if it had 

 had the yellow colour proper to the wheat from which it was 

 made. Neither the baker nor the public concern themselves in 

 the very slightest as to the nutritive value of the loaf : if the 

 scientist attempt to do this on their behalf, he will be unable, as 

 the result of his chemical analysis, to find the slightest differ- 

 ence ; nor will the physiologist, when asked to compare the 

 relative digestive values of the two loaves, be able to distinguish 

 between them. If such be the case, how can the buyer be said 

 to have been defrauded ? The baker could not have sold the 

 yellow loaf at the same price as the white one and therefore 

 would not have bought the yellow flour. 



Chemical Changes produced by Bleaching Flour 



The chemical changes occurring in flour as the result ot 

 bleaching are dealt with in the report. Logically the discussion 

 should have been followed by a similar consideration of bread, 

 since this is the form in which flour is actually used by the 

 public. Dr. Hamill, however, is discreetly silent on this point. 

 In properly bleached flour the chemical change produced by 

 bleaching is exceedingly small : usually the only noticeable 

 feature is the presence of a few parts per million of nitrites. 

 Dr. Monier-Williams's figures, based on his own analyses of 

 seventy samples of flour and on data afforded by the examination 

 of 157 other English samples, show that no flour purchased 

 commercially contained more than 4*5 parts of sodium nitrite 



