34 Canadian Record of Science. 
American diet. From this it appeared that the American 
consumed considerably above the standard of necessity, and 
wasted a great deal more, while the European rarely ex- 
celled the standard, and frequently fell below it. Among the 
working classes of Europe, the sewing girls of London and 
the factory girls of Leipsic were poorest fed, while the 
brewers were best fed. In America, all classes of working 
people consumed far more than was necessary for the 
maintenance of health and strength. 
Under the term “ Nutrients,’ he classed protein (the 
lean of meat, white of eggs, casein of milk, gluten of wheat, 
ete.,) which supply blood, muscle, tendon, and bones; fats, 
animal and vegetable, which serve as fuel for the body; 
carbo-hydrates, starch, and sugar, which also make fat and 
supply the body with heat. The nutrients of vegetable 
food are much less costly than those of animal foods, but 
the latter have the advantage of containing large propor- 
tions of protein in more digestible forms. At market prices 
current in the Eastern States, the cost of protein, which 
may be taken as a measure of the relative expensiveness, 
ranges from 8 to 34 cents per pound in staple foods, and 
from 18 cents to over $1 a pound in staple animal foods, 
In oystersit is from $2 to over $3 per pound, while in salmon 
it rises to over $5 a pound. In beef, at from 10 to 25 cents 
a pound, the protein ranges from about 40 cents to $1.10. 
In such fish as shad, bluefish, halibut, mackerel, lake trout, 
and whitefish, the nutritive material costs more. The less 
expensive kinds of meat, such as the shoulder and the 
round of beef and ham, contain as much nutriment as the 
costlier kinds, and the difference palatably is more the 
result of the manner of cooking than of any innate 
superiority in the higher priced cuts. So, too, the different 
grades of flour have a much more nearly equal nutritive 
value than is commonly supposed. Wheat flour, cornmeal, 
oatmeal, and other cereal products are in general, cheaper 
and richer in nutrients than potatoes and other roots. 
Taking the world throughout, the mass of mankind 
selects foods which analysis shows to furnish actual 
nutrients at the lowest cost, But the people of the United 
=) ae 
