Report <m the Means of Supplying the Poor with Food. 39 



pense of the Night Asjlum for the Houseless, where several thousand 

 dinner rations are distributed daily, we shall find the loss as follows: — 

 On Soup and Loaf Bread to 1,500 persons. 



£9 1 7 



Thus it appears, that the allowance to each person for dinner, is 

 6i ounces. At this rate, there being a saving of 40 lbs. of bread by 

 the unfermonted plan ; the saving would supply 98 additional persons 

 with bread, or a larger allowance might be granted to the others. 



2. It is highly necessary, that in order to retain the human consti- 

 tution in a healthy condition, variety of food should be properly at- 

 tended to. (1.) Soups may be used, having as their basis the gelatin 

 of bones, procured either by boiling bones carefully, or by abstract- 

 ing the earthy matter by means of acids ; and pease meal with meat, 

 as hearts, livers, &c., should contain succulent vegetables, as greens, 

 carrots, and turnips. (2.) Soups consisting of potatoes with gelatin 

 and other meat, may also be made very palatable by the addition of 

 succulent vegetables. (3.) A good soup may be made with salt fish 

 well steeped in water, and boiled up with potatoes. 



3. If salt fish can be procured cheap, an excellent substantial dish 

 may be formed of fish and potatoes, in the form of a pudding, like a 

 beat potato pudding. 



4. In the broths or soups, barley may be used, or rice ; but the most 

 nutritious substance for making a body to the soup, is pease meal or 

 split peas, and the least nutritive of farinacious substances is rice. 



5. A good soup may be made with salt fish or fresh fish, and split 

 peas. 



An alternation somewhat in the following rotation, might be intro- 

 duced in feeding the poor: — • 



Breakfast, Porridge and Milk. 



Dinner, Ist day, Pea Soup, with Meat and Bones. 



2d — Fish Soup, with Peas. 



3d — Potato Soup, with Bones and Meat. 



4th — Pish Pie, with Potatoes. 



We trust, that the day is fast approaching when the light of science 

 will enable the guardians of the poor to manage our poverty-stricken 

 fellow-men by precise and definite rules ; and will teach all classes 

 of the community that the quantity of vital air supplied by the Creator 

 to man, is based upon fixed laws which require the imbibition of a 

 certain amount of food. An adult consumes every day 30 J ounces of 



