[Illustration:  Blackburn College students preparing dinner.  Fortunately girls may study dietetics in the school that teaches them the law of gravity and the rules for forming French plurals]

Fortunately the girl who so desires may now learn something of these feeding laws in the same school that teaches her the law of gravitation or the rules for forming French plurals.  Fortunately, also, the girls of to-day seem inclined to undertake such study.  It is not too much to expect that the girl of the future will be able to set before her family meals scientifically planned or food wisely and economically purchased, well cooked, and attractively served.  Nor is it too much to expect that teachers will be able to do these things and to instruct others how to do them.  That this ideal requires considerable and varied knowledge is clear at the outset.  The serving of a single meal involves:  (1) knowledge of food values, (2) skill in making a “balanced ration,” (3) knowledge of market conditions, (4) skill in buying, with special reference to personal tastes and financial conditions, (5) knowledge of the chemistry of cooking, (6) skill in applying chemical knowledge, (7) skill in adapting knowledge of cooking to existing conditions, (8) knowledge of serving a meal and practice in service.

The fact that a large proportion of deaths is directly due to digestive troubles is certainly food for thought.  Such a statement alone would warrant action of some sort looking toward increased knowledge of food values and food preparation.  It is not necessarily because people live upon homemade food that their digestions are impaired, as we so often hear stated nowadays, but because we have taken it for granted that, given a stove, a saucepan, and a spoon, any woman could instinctively combine flour, water, and yeast into food.  There is little dependence upon instinct in producing the bread of commerce.  Bakers’ bread is scientifically made, no doubt; but there is no reason why the homemade article may not also be a product of science.  And there will always be this difference between the baker and the housewife:  the baker’s profit must be expressed in dollars and cents, while that of the housewife will be represented in increased force and efficiency in the family that she feeds.  With such differing ends in view, the processes and results of each must continue to differ as widely as we know they do at present.

It is now some years since Charlotte Perkins Gilman wrote of woman’s work: 

Six hours a day the woman spends on food,
Six mortal hours!
* * * * *
Till the slow finger of heredity
Writes on the forehead of each living man,
Strive as he may:  “His mother was a cook!”

[Illustration:  A Blackburn College student mixing bread.  There is no reason why homemade bread may not be the product of science]