20 Food-Grains of India. 



exceeded in actual practice, though much less is demanded in 

 Indian Government relief works. 



We shall assume, in all our calculated dietaries and rations, 

 that the body-weight is 105 lbs. only ; it will be easy to add 

 one-tenth to the calculated quantities given if the individuals 

 to be fed weigh 115 lbs. ; and we shall propose three dietaries : 

 one (A) for bare sustenance; one (B) for moderate work; and 

 one (C) for hard work. We have touched upon the principles 

 underlying such dietaries in a previous section ; into the various 

 controversies as to the relations of nitrogenous and carbonaceous 

 nutrients to work, this is not the place to enter ; but for details 

 of the most recent theories on this subject we may refer our 

 readers to the work by Dr. C. A. Meinert, named in our 

 " Bibliographical Notes," p. xi. 



Here are the amounts needed daily for the three dietaries 

 above indicated, expressed in avoirdupois ounces and decimals of 

 an ounce. 



starch, etc. Starch-equivalent. Nutrient-ratio. 



7-520 ... 9-250 ... I : 4-34 



, 12-531 ... 1,5-779 ... I : 5-34 



11-190 ... 16-954 ... I : 4-66 



The attempt to realise these exact figures in actual practice 

 would be useless ; but there are many combinations of food 

 materials which may be made to approach them with quite 

 sufficient accuracy. Two guiding principles should not be lost 

 sight of; namely, to keep down the pulse-constituent to an 

 amount not exceeding 7 ounces per diem, and, if possible, 

 not more than 5 ounces, and to ensure the presence of a 

 sufficiency of albuminoids by increasing the cereal constituents 

 of the ration, even if in so doing the quantity of starch required 

 be thereby raised above the necessary amount. Indeed, in the 

 case of a bare-sustenance ration, or where little or no labour is 

 demanded from the persons fed, it has been proved beyond doubt 

 that the starch may be largely increased and the albuminoids 

 largely diminished without deranging the general health or 

 lowering the body-weight. Thus a dietary in which the nutrient- 



