1896 THE MICROSCOPE. 21 



Fermentation of Bread. 



K. E. GOLDEN. 

 TvAPAYETTE, IND. 



The production of bread is of vital importance to a peo- 

 ple, as it furnishes so large a part of their diet, this being 

 specially true of fermented bread. While the baking 

 powder companies hare advertised so extensively and got- 

 ten cooking school teachers to advocate their wares so 

 persistently, the majority of the people still insist on pre- 

 ferring the fermented bread. Yet, compared with other 

 articles of diet, it has received very little attention from 

 the scientific point of view. People are content to take 

 what they can get from the bakers, or else to cling to the 

 old methods of making it at home. Scientists abroad 

 have studied the fermentation of bread to determine what 

 caused it, this being specially true of the leavened breads. 

 But little attention has been given to the subject from 

 the point of view of making better bread, and of control- 

 iug the fermentation by determining what organisms 

 caused it, then using only those organisms from which 

 most desirable results could be obtained. 



Work of this nature has been taken up by investigators 

 on beer, and now brewing is reduced to a science. The 

 work in this direction is of comparatively recent date, 

 but a great deal has been done, as was to be expected 

 from such men as Pasteur and Reess, and at the present 

 time, Hansen. At first thought there does not seem to 

 be much connection between the art of bread-making and 

 that of brewing, but that there is a very close one, has 

 been amply demonstrated. 



Bread-making is of very ancient origin ; our prehis- 

 toric ancestors knew the art as early as the Stone Period, 

 as excavations made on the site of the lake dwellings in 

 Switzerland have given proof, and witness also its fre- 

 quent mention in the Bible. The Egyptians were well 



