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nitrogen, cannot do. The carbohydrates and fats serve for 

 fuel, yielding heat to keep the body warm and muscular strength 

 for work. Protein compounds can also serve for fuel. 



Since protein can do the work of the carbohydrates in 

 furnishing heat and muscular power, and has a work of its own 

 to do in building up the tissues of the body which the other 

 nutrients cannot perform, the protein compounds are the most 

 important of the food ingredients. And when we compare the 

 quantities of the different nutrients in food with the market 

 prices of foods, we find that protein is by far the most expen- 

 sive. It costs, pound for pound, several times as much as fats 

 and carbohydrates. The fats are more expensive than the 

 carbohydrates and have a higher fuel value. In short, fish 

 furnishes protein to form muscle and other nitrogenous parts 

 of the body. Some kinds of fish contain considerable fat also. 

 Since the protein is the most important and the most expen- 

 sive of the food ingredients and fat is more costly and valuable 

 than carbohydrates, it is evident that fish is an extremely 

 valuable article of food. Indeed the importance of fish in 

 domestic and in national economy has not yet come to be 

 justly appreciated. 



Our national diet is one-sided ; we eat too much of the fats 

 and carbohydrates and relatively too little protein. This 

 comes from our enormous consumption of highly fattened 

 meats and of sweetmeats. As population becomes denser and 

 economy becomes more necessary we shall have to devote 

 relatively less of the productive power of our land to meat 

 production. If we can replace part of the meat that we con- 

 sume by fish, it will be greatly to our advantage as regards 

 both health and purse. In the older and more densely popu- 

 lated countries of the world, as Europe and Asia, the food of 

 the people is mainly vegetable, and is relatively deficient in 

 protein. To produce meat to supply protein seems impossible. 

 It thus appears, that, the world over, by fish-culture, the rivers 

 and the sea are made to rightly supplement the land in the pro- 

 duction of food for man. I hope in another place to enlarge 

 upon these statements and to cite statistics to illustrate them, 

 but must now go back to my subject, the digestibility of fish. 



