232 



SCIENCE. 



[Vol. XI. No. 276 



ago part of the uninhabitable polar regions, may become settled in 

 course of time, as it possesses considerable natural resources. The 

 great length of navigable rivers facilitates communication. The 

 extent of continuous lake coast and river navigation is estimated at 

 6,500 miles, broken only in two places there situated upon the Great 

 Slave and Athabasca Rivers. It is stated that there is a pastoral 

 area of 860,000 square miles, arable lands to the extent of 274.000 

 square miles, while 400,000 square miles are considered useless for 

 cultivation and stock-raising. The climate of this region is de- 

 scribed as more favorable, as is generally assumed, and comparable 

 in certain districts to that of western Ontario. It appears that 

 there is an abundance of tish, and an ample supply of wood suit- 

 able for building-purposes. Among the mineral products, special 

 attention is called to the extensive auriferous area and to the large 

 petroleum-fields. The energetic attempts of Canada to develop the 

 resources of the country have led to an increase of immigration to 

 their western provinces. Undoubtedly the present inquiry will 

 help to direct attention to the resources of those remote regions. 



ECONOMY OF FOOD. 



In February we sent out from the office of Science a circular 

 letter to a number of physicians, political-economists, and others 

 likely to be posted and interested in the economy of food. In this 

 letter we called attention to Prof. W. O. Atwater's article on the 

 subject in the Century for January, and stated that it is generally 

 believed that even those who wish and try to economize in the pur- 

 chase and use of food very often do not understand how, and that 

 while they consult carefully the prices they pay, and judge from 

 these the nutritive value of the articles, they are frequently mis- 

 led. 



Our questions sought for information as to the existence of a 

 considerable tendency among people of moderate means to bad 

 economy in the following respects : first, in the purchase of food 

 either of needlessly expensive kinds or ill-balanced quantities ; sec- 

 ond, in the cooking of food ; third, in the actual waste of food, that 

 is, the throvving-away of nutritious material instead of consuming 

 it economically ; finally we asked for suggestions as to such means 

 as might be deemed appropriate for correcting any of these forms 

 of bad economy that might exist. 



Responses were received from various portions of the country ; 

 and while the evidence was generally to the effect that there did 

 exist a considerable tendency among people of moderate means 

 to bad economy, there were several noteworthy opinions to the con- 

 trary. 



Mr. P. H. Felker, editor of the St. Louis Grocer, stated that he 

 has had an experience in the retail grocery trade, and does not 

 think that people of moderate means exhibit bad economy, as a 

 rule, in the purchase of expensive kinds of food. Nor does he 

 believe that much is thrown away by poor people. His experience 

 is, that those who pay for what they buy do not waste, but that 

 those who do not intend to pay, but expect the world to give them 

 a living, are careless and wasteful. 



Charles N. Chapin of Providence, R.I., is another of the dissent- 

 ers. He believes that there can be little question that there is a 

 tendency to purchase needlessly expensive qualities of all kinds of 

 food, but he is certain that there is not nearly as much extrava- 

 gance absolutely among such persons as there is among the rich or 

 even well-to-do, and he doubts very much whether there is rela- 

 tively as much. According to his experience, day-laborers, work- 

 ers in mills and factories, and the poorer class of mechanics, do 

 not as a rule purchase as fine a quality of meat and groceries as do 

 those in better circumstances. There is a large grocery in his city 

 whose patrons are chiefly well-to-do or rich, and this grocery has 

 never taken out an ' oleo ' license ; while in the stores in the poorer 

 parts of the same city, and in the manufacturing villages, oleo is 

 sold in large quantities, sometimes almost to the exclusion of but- 

 ter. The dealer in choice groceries informs him that he sells five 

 barrels of Haxall flour to one of St. Louis, while in the mill villages 

 the proportion is two to one in favor of St. Louis. A butcher 

 having some of the best trade in Providence, and also having a 



store in a neighboring manufacturing village, states that he sold 

 cheaper and leaner meat in the village than in the city, yet this 

 same man says that some of his most extravagant customers in the 

 city were among the poor. As at this point Mr. Chapin makes an 

 important suggestion, we quote his words: "And just here, it 

 seems to me, is the place where an error has crept into Professor 

 Atwater's article, and also into the report of the Massachusetts 

 Labor Bureau. In the case above mentioned the majority of the 

 persons who bought at the city store were rich, and those who 

 were not were chiefly coachmen, washerwomen, janitors, and per- 

 sons who were objects of charity ; in other words, those who were 

 brought into comparatively close contact with the rich, and who 

 hence aped their manners and tastes. Such people are often the 

 most extravagant in the world. I think it will be found that it is 

 chiefly in neighborhoods or in stores where the rich and poor pur- 

 chase together that an inordinate extravagance will be found on 

 the part of the poor. I am positive that in our manufacturing vil- 

 lages and in the manufacturing sections of this city, the working- 

 people, while requiring good food, do not consume such a higb 

 grade of goods as do those in better circumstances." In regard 

 to the actual waste, — non-consumption of foods purchased, — Mr. 

 Chapin holds that all evidence goes to show that the poor are much 

 more economical than the well-to-do or the rich. In Providence 

 the swill-contractor gets the same amount of swill from less than 

 six thousand persons in the wealthy part of the city as he does 

 from over twelve thousand persons in a manufacturing district ; 

 and the swill in the former case contains a large amount of nutri- 

 tive material, while in the latter case it consists chiefly of bones, 

 codfish-skins, parings from boiled potatoes, etc. Mr. Chapin be- 

 lieves that the use of novel or artificial articles of food, such as 

 canned goods, oleo, glucose, cottonseed-oil, baking-powders, etc., 

 tends to make living cheaper, while these foods are in many 

 cases just as palatable as the more expensive. Mr. Chapin finally 

 suggests that it is, after all, a question whether any but a very few, 

 the very poor, need to practise much greater economy than they do. 

 While it is true that the neck is as nutritious as a sirloin steak, it 

 is equally true that the latter is more palatable. A man would be 

 comfortable in patched clothes and a room with whitewashed 

 walls and a bare floor, yet we do not consider it a sin or even un- 

 wise for the majority of even wage-earners to make their surround- 

 ings agreeable. 



Mr. David Murray of the University of the State of New York 

 has serious doubts whether the prejudice which Professor Atwater 

 speaks of, against the purchase of cheap food, exists to any very 

 considerable extent. 



We have also to class among the doubters of the waste of food 

 Mrs. M. Fay Peirce, New York, author of ' Co-operative House- 

 keeping.' 



Mrs. Fay's experience is, " that Americans, especially men. crave 

 meat three times a day ; and if they can get it, they have it. No 

 doubt," she says, " they could do with meat once a day, and make 

 up in milk and eggs. The fact remains the same, that the human 

 system prefers a great deal of meat ; and may not the enormous 

 energy and enterprise of the American people, and the large aver- 

 age of mental work which as a nation Americans accomplish, be 

 in great measure due to the national indulgence in meat ? In 

 answer to the first question, I should therefore hesitate to say that 

 too much meat is purchased by our people. Second, Roast meat 

 and broiled meat are, of course, infinitely more enjoyable than boiled 

 and stewed meats. No matter how exquisitely flavored the ragouts, 

 the appetite will tire of them ; but of beefsteak and mutton-chops 

 broiled, or of roast beef and roast mutton, etc., people never tire. 

 You cannot, however, roast or broil cheap and tough meat : hence 

 Americans buy the roasting and broiling pieces. If they liked a 

 savory stew as well, of course they would save their money and buy 

 it. The simple fact is, that no art of the cook can equal the flavors 

 of nature. Roast and broiled meat is meat auiiaturel, and, as long 

 as the poor man can pay for it, he may be expected to indulge in it. 

 Moreover, no doubt such meat is far more exhilarating and nourish- 

 ing than boiled and stewed meats. Third, I do not believe that 

 poor people throw away any thing they can eat. I believe that 

 every thing they buy is eaten except the bones and the potato and 

 squash parings ; and, in general, the women who do their own 



