If the heat of summer, the health of the body, or any other reason, make it desirable to reduce the daily meat ration, no one need be concerned; the bounty of Nature provides many healthful and agreeable substitutes.

- Everyday Science.

THAT meat in the diet is not essential for efficiency - for many people at least - is shown by the fact that a Chinese coolie, for a day's work, carried a pack of tea weighing a hundred and fifty pounds over forty miles of road on a diet almost exclusively of rice; that the almost indefatigable Japanese soldiers are rice-fed; that a vegetarian won the recent walking race of the British Isles from Land's End to John o' Groats, doing the nine hundred and eight miles in less than seventeen days.

Whether or not the use of meat is best for health and efficiency has never been fully agreed upon. It is more or less a personal question, depending to a great extent upon the dietary habits formed in childhood, and upon one's occupation; but doubtless we, as a nation, eat too much meat. In many American homes, meat is eaten three times a day. This mistaken idea of being well-fed may have come about because of lack of knowledge of the amount of protein contained in some other foods.

A quart of milk, three-quarters of a pound of moderately fat beef, and five ounces of bread, all contain about the same amount of nutritive material. The milk comes the nearest of being a perfect food. Cheese, made of the curd of milk, stands almost at the head of the list of foods as far as nutritive value is concerned; but in large amounts, or when cooked at high temperature, it is not readily digested by some people. In cooking, it should be diluted with milk or used with other food, because it is so highly concentrated; and it should be well masticated. The question of digestion is again a personal one, about which no wholesale statement can be made. It is well to serve such green vegetables as lettuce, watercress, celery, with this concentrated food.

In looking for ideal meat substitutes, eggs immediately suggest themselves, not only because of their high nutritive value, but because of their pleasing appearance when cooked, and because of the great variety of dishes which can be made from their use.

Among vegetables rich in protein and in fuel value, dried beans, peas, and lentils are excellent substitutes for meat. They contain as much protein as meat, and their fuel value is almost equal to that of cheese, and they are used extensively by people who, either from choice or necessity, eat little or no meat. Care must be taken, however, to have them very thoroughly cooked. The impoverished Mexican uses at almost every meal the native bean or frijole, made palatable with green vegetables and chile or red pepper. There is a Hindoo proverb, "Rice is good, but lentils are my life," showing in what esteem the protein of the lentil was held even among ancient peoples.

Nuts also are used as substitutes for meat; for they are very rich in oil, with only a small percentage of starch and sugar, and are also rich in nitrogen (protein). Though frequently indigestible when used by themselves, if properly combined with other foods, they should be quite easy of digestion by any normal person.