FOODS 29 



be eaten with as much safety as beef or pork. Raw 

 oysters are especially valuable for sick people, for the 

 dark mass which is often thought to be their intestine 

 is really their liver and helps digest them. 



48. Difference between animal and vegetable foods. 

 All animal food is more easily digested than vegetable 

 food, and should be used by children and sick persons. 

 It contains little or no starch, however, and some vege- 

 table food must be eaten for the sake of its starch. All 

 vegetable food contains some albumin an'd a large amount 

 of starch or sugar and little fat. It is possible to live a 

 healthy life while eating only vegetable food, but this is \ 

 by no means the best kind of food. 



49. Vegetable food. Bread is about one half starch, 

 and one fifteenth albumin, and hardly one seventieth fat. 

 In it the albumin is more easily digested than in any 

 other kind of vegetable food, yet less so than the albumin 

 of animal food. It is not a perfect food, for the starch 

 is in too large amount, but with meat or eggs it is a 

 perfect food. With milk it is also a valuable food, espe- 

 cially for the young. Cake is much like bread, but it 

 contains more sugar. 



Potatoes have a large amount of starch and very little 

 albumin, and no fat. They are good food with meat, but 

 are hard to digest. 



Beans are one fourth albumin and one half starch. For 

 a strong person they are a valuable food, but weak persons 

 find it hard to digest them. 



Cereals, like corn meal and rice, are from two thirds to 

 three fourths starch, and only one eighth to one fifteenth 

 albumin. Only corn contains much fat, but all vegetable 

 fat is hard to digest, and is of little value as food. 



50. Fruit. Fruit contains some starch and albumin 



