Of the nutritious proteinaceous or nitrogenous articles of diet, it may be added that the sub stance called protein is the basis. Protein is the first element that appears in the development of the vegetable cell. It is consequently universally present in plants. It also constitutes the chief material of the tissues of animals. In the vege table and animal kingdoms it assumes various forms, and is called albumen, fibrine, and caseine, according to its physical and animal properties. Herbivorous and graminivorous animals derive this constituent directly from the vegetable kingdom; the carnivora obtain it indirectly from tile plants, through the animals that they cat. Man obtains his supply of protein from both sources.
The fat of animals, ghi or clarified butter, and the sesamum oil are almost the sole oleaginous or fatty substances used in the S. and E. of Asia for food. Pure butter is rarely used. These consist of carbon 11, hydrogen 10, and oxygen 1, and their value in the animal economy is as heat-producers, for which they are superior to sugar or starch. The oleaginous principle, how ever, seems also to aid in the development of the proteinaceous tissues, and to act as a kind of preparation for their growth. In disease, oils are of undoubted value.
Many tables have been published showing the chemical composition of the various substances used as food by man. Perhaps those by Dep. Inspector-General Mayer of the Madras army, Dr. Lyon Playfair, and Dr. Watson, are the most valuable.
The following table shows the composition of food iu 100 parts :— The following table shows the relative quantities of nitrogenous matter contained in various cereals and pulses. The abundance of this element, together with substances abounding in carbonaceous or starchy matter, in 100 parts, varies in specimens from different parts of India :— The following lists of cereal grains and pulses give the names of the principal food-plants cultivated in the Madras Presidency :— Hordeum hex., barley ; Joss'.
Triticum rest., wheat ; Giboon, Codoomay. Eleusine coraeana, ragi ; Natchnee rag-i, Kavaru. Oryza sativa, rice ; Chawl, Arisi.
Setaria Italica, Italian millet ; Kala-kangnee, Tenr S. Germanica, Gerrnan millet ; Kora-kang. Panieum Iniliaccum, common millet ; &twee ch warm°, Varugoo.
Penicillaria spicata, spiked millet ; Bajri, Cumboo. Sorghum vuL, great millet ; Jowari, Cholum.
Zea mays, Indian corn ; Mukka jowari, Boota, eholum.
Pulses arul Millets for Man or Beast.
Medicago sat., lucerne.
Trigonella. feenum grzec., fenugreek ; Maitee ki bajee, Vendium.
Psoralea corylifolia, hazel-leaved psoralea ; Bawurcheen, Karpooga arid.
Cicer ariet., Bengal gram ; Channa, Cadalei.
Ervum lens, lentil ; Massur, Massurpurpoo.
Pisum sativ., common pea ; Button], Puttani. Phaseolus vul., French bean ; Bakla.
P. lunatus, Duffan bean.
P. radiatus, green gram ; Hari, Moong, Putcha. payroo. P. mungo, moong or monash, green gram ; Mash, Oolandoo.
Dolichos uniflorus, Madras gram; Kulti, Kollu.
D. Sinenbis ; Stiffed lobeh.
Lablab vulgazis, Bullar ; Saim ki-puttee, Motchay cottay.
L. vulgaris, var. ; Suffed, Vellay mochay. Psophocarpus tetragonolobus, winged pea ; Pankko mutur.
Canavalia glad irtta, sword bean ;Lal kudsumbab, Segapu, 'Thumbetten.
Cajanus Intlicus, pigeon-pea ; Tur dhal, Tovarai, Purpoo. var., dhoti, Lal-toor, Segapu tovarat. P/ „ Pad-ka-toor, Malay tovarai.
Esculent Vegetables. Allium cepa, the onion.
Amarantus polygamus, greens; vegetables. A. atropurpureus, purple vegetable. Andropogon esculenturn, or lemon grass. Amchis hypogrea, the earth nut, Arun.' furfaraceum, scaly yam.
Batatas edulis, sweet potato.
Capsicum purpureum, red pepper.
C. minimum, small or bird a-eyo pepper. Cucumis usitata, largo cucumber.
C. sativus, common cucumber.
C. citrullis, or water melon.
Dioscorea purpurea, purple yam.
D. glabra, the smooth yam.
D. rubella, the red yam.
D. anguina, the snake yam.
Dolichos eatjang, long or French bean. D. lablab, the Indian bean.
Ifedisartun tuberoaum, the Batraj bean. Hibiscus sabdariffa, red sorrel or roselle.
longifolius, variety for do.
Jatropha manihot, the cassava yam. Luffa pentandra, five-eornered gourd.
L. deeandra, ten-cornered gourd.
Lagenaria vulgaris, cuddoo or bottle-gourd.
L. pipo, the pumpldn.
L. raelo-pipo, or squash.
Momordtca charantia, or small gourd.
Ocimum vilosum, mint.
Raphantts aativus, or radish.
Solanurn melongena, brinjal.
S. lycopersica, tomato or love-apple.
Triehosanthes anguina, the snake gourd.
With a rapidly-increasing population in all parts of the world, the production of food is an object of the first importance to all classes; and the vegetable substances from which matt derives his principal sustenance, necessarily occupy the main attention of the cultivator, while the pro ducts form most important staples of domestic and foreign commerce. The breadstuffs of com
merce consist of the nutritious cereal grain.s, the tuberous rooted plants, and the farinto yielded by trees. Amongst these are wheat, barley, oats, rice, maize, millet, Guinea corn, the sago of palms, of the plantain and banana, the bread fruit tree, the edible root-crops and starch-pro ducing plants, which are a somewhat extensive class, the chief of which, however, arc the COMM011 potato, yams, coco or eddo, sweet potato, the bitter and sweet cassava or manioc, the arrow root, sago, and other plants yielding starch in moro or less purity. Wheat, maize, and rice form very important articles of commerce, and are largely cultivated for local consumption mid export, a portion being consumed in the arts, as starch for stiffening linens, etc., and for other purposes not coming under tho term of food. The kind of bread in common uso in a country depends partly on the taste of the inhabitants, but more on the sort of grain suitable for its soil. The Chinese use little breatl, and that little is generally of wheat-flour. In the Panjab, wheat, barley, and millets are consumed in nearly equal propor tions ; in Berar, Bombay, and Mysore, eighty-two per cent. of the food-growing area is sown with millets ; in Bengal, Assam, and Burma, rice is the chief product ; in Madras, oue-third rice and two thirds Cakes of wheat-flour prepared on the girdle are a common article of diet amongst the mces of Northern and Central India. Further south, on the table-lands of the Peninsula, the natives of India use unleavened cakes made of the great millet, Sorghum vulgare, the spiked millet, Penieillaria spieata ; and the very poor of the people use the hard ragi, Eleusine coracana, in the form of cakes or ixwridge. Barley is occa sionally used t,o tho westward. Cakes made of the flour of the Indian corn, the Zea mays, are scarcely used in India. They are rather leas nutritious than those i_nade from wheat, but more fattening, in consequence of the greater quantity of oil contained in it. Along the seaboard, however, of all the south-east of Asia, in the deltas and valleys of the great rivers, the Indus, the Ganges, the Brahmaputra, in all Bengal, all Burma, in the delta and valley of the Irawadi, in all the seaboard and near the great rivers of China, rice is the longed-for article of diet, boiled and eaten alone, or with a little animal food, or with condiments made into curry or chatni ; or it is made into the cakes which are sold through the bazars under the familiar name of appa' or hoppers. In the interior of India, on the table lands, other grains and pulses are used, such as wheat, the various millets, and Indian corn ; aud in Northern India, the pulses, chick-pea, the lentil, and dhals are all in extensive use. But well-to-do people prefer rice, which is more and more used as increasing prosperity enables them to obtain it, and the people speak of using it once or twice a day or week; to indicate their larger or smaller means. The facility with which it can be cooked, the little cost of cooking it, and its lightness in digestion, axe its great recommen dations, the cleaning, grinding, and cooki g of the harder grains costing much time and money. Rice flour is scarcely ever made into fermented bread, although it is said to be occasionally mixed with wheat flour for that purpose. The superi ority of wheat to all other farinaceous plants in the manufacture of bread is very great. Its essential constituents are starch, also called farina or fecula, gluten, and a little sugar and albumen. It is occasionally adulterated with alum, which is added to whiten the flour, and to enable it to retain a larger quantity of water. Salt is also employed in the adulteration of wheaten bread, to whiten the flour, and enable it to hold more water, and carbonate of magnesia is fraudulently used to obtain the same result. In Eastern and Southern Asia, the ordinary wood bread, the well known sago, is made from the starch granules contained in the piths of several species of palms. In the Archipelago, sago flour and prepared sago are largely used as an article of diet, alike for the robust labourer and for the invalid, and in a prepared form is extensively exported for the use of the sick and the nursery. Amongst the Arabs, burghoul consists of wheat boiled with leaven, and then dried in the sun. The dried wheat is pre served for a year, and boiled with butter and oil. Leavened bread is called Khubz khamir, and unleavened bread Khubz fatir.