270 MISCELLANEOUS ENQUIRIES 



more branny portions of the grain also contain a much 

 larger percentage of mineral matter. ... It is, however, we 

 think, very questionable whether, upon such data alone, a 

 valid opinion can be formed of the comparative values, as food, 

 of bread made from the finer or coarser flours from one and 

 the same grain. . . . Again, it is an indisputable fact that 

 branny particles, when admitted into the flour in the degree of 

 imperfect division in which our ordinary milling processes leave 

 them, very considerably increase the peristaltic action, and 

 hence the alimentary canal is cleared much more rapidly of its 

 contents. It is also well known that the poorer classes almost 

 invariably prefer the whiter bread ; and among some of them 

 who work the hardest, and who, consequently, would soonest 

 appreciate a difference in nutritive quality (navvies for example), 

 it is distinctly stated that their preference for the whiter bread 

 is founded on the fact that the browner passes through them 

 too rapidly, consequently before their systems have extracted 

 from it as much nutritious matter as it ought to yield them. 

 It is freely granted that much useful nutritious matter is, in the 

 first instance, lost as human food, in the abandonment of 15 to 

 20 per cent, of our wheat grain to the lower animals. It 

 should be remembered, however, that the amount of food so 

 applied is by no means entirely wasted. And further, we 

 think it more than doubtful, even admitting that an increased 

 proportion of mineral and nitrogenous constituents would be 

 an advantage, whether, unless the branny particles could be 

 either excluded, or so reduced as to prevent the clearing action 

 above alluded to, more nutriment would not be lost to the 

 system by this action than would be gained by the introduction 

 into the body, coincidentally with it, of a larger actual amount 

 of supposed nutritious matters. In fact, all experience tends 

 to show that the state, as well as the chemical composition of 

 our food, must be considered ; in other words, that its digesti- 

 bility, and aptitude for assimilation, are not less important 

 qualities than its ultimate composition. 



" Of course, if the branny portions were reduced to a 



