UNIT XI 

 THE FOODS WE EAT 



PREVIEW 



If you could take a trip around the world, you would be 

 much amused to see what different kinds of foods dif- 

 ferent people eat. In Japan we would find fish and rice 

 most used as food ; in China, rice or millet, fish, and some 

 strange foods, such as edible birds' nests and shark fins ; 

 in the Philippines the natives would be found eating the 

 fish they catch and the native fruits and vegetables found 

 there in abundance ; in India, corn often takes the place 

 of rice and we have milk and butter used as well as many 

 vegetables and fruits that we know and like. The story 

 would be different for each country, for each would have 

 its own peculiar foods, but all people use food for the 

 same purpose that we do. 



What is true of man is equally true of plants and other 

 animals. A plant as well as an animal may starve to 

 death. Ask any farmer about this. Does this mean 

 that a plant actually eats soil, water, and sunlight, or do 

 plants use foods as we do? Green plants do use foods 

 for the same purposes as animals do, but there is a great 

 difference in the way they get their food. 



Do the different kinds of foods really make any differ- 

 ence in our growth or the way we feel? We can answer 

 that question by feeding white rats on different foods to 

 see what happens. Rats use the same kinds of food that 

 man does, so the results of feeding rats help to show 

 what the effect would be on man. Recently a series of 



307 



