i06 THE KEASON WHY. 



"Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and cometh down from 



the Father of lights, with whom is no variableness, neither shadow 



o.' turning." JAMES I. 



according to the amount of sta/vh which it contains. It is moat 

 abundantly found in the seeds of plants, and especially in the 

 wheat tribe. 



It is also met with in the cellular tissues of plants, and especially 

 in such underground stems as the potatoe, carrot, turnip, 4"c., and 

 the stems of the sago-palm fig, &c. It is also found in the baric of 

 some trees. 



1203. Why is the Jiorse chesnut, though containing a great 

 quantity of starch, unfit for food? 



Because (like many other vegetable productions) it contains with 

 the starch an acrid juice, which renders it unhealthy ; and although 

 the juice can be separated from the starch, the process is too 

 expensive to be made generally available. 



The starch which is used for domestic purposes is an artificial preparation, 

 and does not properly represent the starch of nutrition, A better idea of it is 

 afforded by the meal of a flowery potatoe. The starch used by laundresses is 

 frequently prepared from diseased potatoes. This does not impair the quality 

 of the starch, for the purposes of the laundress, and the reason why potatoes 

 that are diseased are thus applied is, that it is one method of saving some part 

 of their value. The finest kinds of starch are prepared from rice. It is 

 prepared by breaking the pulp, and disengaging the starch from the cells ; and 

 it is then put through other processes to remove the fragments of the broken 

 cells. But in the flowery meal of the potatoe, the starch cell may be seen 

 entire. 



CHAPTER LXII. 



1204. What are vegetable oils and fats ? 



Vegetable oils and fats constitute, next to starch and sugar, the 

 most important secretion of the vegetable creation. There are very 

 few plants from which some amount of oil cannot be obtained ; and 

 those which are famed for yielding it owe their celebrity rather 

 to the abundance that they yield, and the peculiar qualities of their 

 oil, than to the secretion of oil being rare for probably there is no 

 plant without it. 



Oil is most commonly found in seeds, as rape-seed, linseed, &c. t 

 but it is found also in leaves, as in the rose, sweet-briar, peppermint 

 &c., where its presence may be recognised by the distinguishing 



