THE WAR GARDEN VICTORIOUS 161 
vegetable saves tin, since it can be put up in paper con- 
tainers. It saves labor in the small home where the 
convenience of its use is apparent. It saves in wastage 
at the point of production and in the home. We little 
appreciate how gigantic the wastage of fresh vegetables 
is, and this wastage is largely because the vegetables are 
too cheap on the market in the height of the season 
to warrant a grower to ship them to it, and it is here 
that dehydration should play an important part. 
There is nothing in the vegetable situation which 
confronts us to-day to assure us of cheaper vegetables 
in the future. We must not forget the small proportion 
of women gardeners in this country as compared with 
the women field- workers of France and Germany and 
even England, and vegetables require a large amount of 
hand labor to produce. Where is the labor coming from ? 
Possessing as we do such remarkable food as Indian 
corn, and having learned, as we have, to like it, there 
would seem to be a danger that we depend too fully 
upon it and, with the increasing price of vegetables, 
fail to realize that as we increase our corn consumption 
we require greater quantities of butter, milk, meat, fats, 
or vegetables to supply the food essentials lacking in 
corn. As the fresh vegetables become scarcer on the 
markets, it would become more and more difficult to do 
this, and the result predicted by dietitians is malnutri- 
tion among those who think they cannot afford to buy 
the vegetables. We should learn to use these dried 
vegetables to supplement the grain ration. 
It is easy to see a hundred reasons why we should 
not eat dried vegetables, but it is unscientific and un- 
patriotic to shut our eyes to their possibilities. As a 
people we should move ahead into the field of dehy- 
drated vegetables, develop it, discard what is not good, 
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