€0 STATE POMOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 



1. The relation of economy in use of food, to its cost; in other 

 words, how may the inevitable expenditure for necessary subsistence 

 be reduced to its lowest terms by a judicious selection of the diet? 



2. The selection of food with reference to what we expect to 

 accomplish in the body, which involves the adoption of food to work 

 in producing and preserving muscular and nervous energy. 



The solution of the second of these problems, the selection of 

 foods, will in a measure furnish a key to the first. It is doubtless 

 true and capable of proof that a useless amount and quality of food 

 is consumed b}' the well-to-do and the needy as well ; that an excess 

 of meat and sweets is a potent source of disease ; that ignorance of 

 proper selection of desirable and agreeable food causes much loss, 

 for which reason the extremely poor generally being those who 

 practice the least economy, suffer most ; and that food may be 

 wasted and thrown away in the stomach, as well as into the waste 

 barrel. 



To the science of chemistry we are indebted for the knowledge 

 which enables us to assert with reference to these questions. Thou- 

 sands of trials and experiments have been made in the laboratories 

 of Europe upon animals of many kinds, and human subjects of both 

 sexes, all ages and weights. The aid of chemistry, physics and 

 physiology, by the most delicate apparatus, has been worked, and 

 the most gratifying result is the application of the knowledge thus 

 gained, to promote the material interest of mankind. Chemistry 

 analyzes the human body and finds it to consist of certain elements 

 and compounds. It demonstrates how by vital processes they are 

 held together, and how they serve their functions, and returning to 

 the forms from which they originated, pass away and are replaced 

 by new. 



The lesson it teaches when applied to food is simple to understand. 

 It takes our various food substances and by resolving them into their 

 component parts, tells us how much of the material used in the body 

 each food contains, how it may be utilized, and how in nature's 

 laboratory it becomes changed or converted into the needed form. 



Out of the more than a hundred different compounds in the human 

 bod}', it will be sufficient for our purpose to outline those of principal 

 importance, since after describing to you the chemical constituents 

 of different fruits, I shall ask you to determine for yourselves the 

 advantage of a judicious mingling of fruits with other food. 



1. The first of the compounds is water, most valuable as forming 

 -a great part of all animal and vegetable tissues ; it forms seven- 



