228 STORRS AGRICULTURAL EXPERIMENT STATION. 
cereal. Consequently, as a source of protein the cereal prep- 
arations by no means compare with the beef. This, rather 
than the energy value, is in reality of most significance, be- 
cause in the cereals the proportion of energy material is too 
large and that of building material too small for proper nutri- 
tion without the use of some material richer in protein. 
If the cereal preparations were compared with cheese the 
latter would appear much superior as a source of both protein 
ANC ECHELS Va 
Other claims, such as that the preparation is very concen- 
trated, and a few spoonsful of it suffice for a whole meal, are 
likewise so ridiculous that it seems hardly possible that any 
one can believe them. Four teaspoons of the average cereal 
product (which is about as concentrated as it is possible to 
make such materials), would not furnish over a tenth of the 
protein and energy that a man at moderate work would obtain 
from his ordinary meal. 
It is not the purpose here to take up in detail the absurdities 
of the various advertisements. One or two typical specimens 
are considered simply to indicate to what extent any such ex- 
travagant statements should be believed. One other feature 
might also be mentioned, that is advertising the preparations 
as if they partake of the nature of patent medicines. Many of 
the statements of this character also pass beyond the realm of 
fact into that of ludicrous fancy. 
For instance, a certain preparation may be recommended be- 
cause it contains ‘“‘the nitrates or muscle makers, the carbon- 
ates or heat makers, and the phosphates or brain makers;’’ and 
it has been very sagely claimed in one advertisement that ‘‘if 
a person should eat only foods containing nitrates, carbonates 
and phosphates, the larger portion of all aches and pains would 
disappear.’’ ‘There is a grain of truth in the last statement, 
but hardly such as the writer of the advertisement intended. 
If a person should eat food containing any considerable propor- 
tion of some nitrates, aches and pains would most certainly dis- 
appear, along with the person who ate such food. Nitrates are 
not muscle makers, but mineral salts, some of which are actually 
poisonous to: the human organism. Nitrate of soda, so largely 
used in growing crops, is a familiar example. Fortunately the 
cereal preparations do not contain nitrates. 

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