THE CONGRESS OF WOMEN.

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in starch, or if not subjected to so great degree of heat as to change it into acid and acrid substances. Pure sugar, taken in suitable quantities, is easily digested, and enters quickly into the circulation, giving us its carbon for warmth. Eggs eaten raw, or properly prepared, that is, cooked at only a moderate degree of heat, are palatable and easily digested; but when hardened by intense heat they become difficult of digestion. Knowing this, why should we overtax our muscular strength by beating butter, sugar and eggs together, mixing them with milk and flour and baking them as cakes, or rolling and frying them as doughnuts, when these same perfect food substances might be as palatable if prepared with far less labor? Why should we subject food materials to the intense heat necessary to cook them when prepared in these compounds, when less heat would suffice, if they were more simply prepared? Or why make them indigestible by uniting so closely substances which must be digested separately; or by over-heating the albumen and scorching the sweet globules of fat, or entangling them in starch and albumen?

Why will women be so foolish? I cannot say, unless it be that we are still slaves to the ways of our mothers and grandmothers, or to the latest freak of fashion, and think we cannot keep house without our patchwork quilts and an unlimited supply of cakes, gingersnaps, cookies, wafers, tarts, doughnuts and pies, or dare not invite a friend to luncheon without serving croquettes, patties and some novel ice or cream.

I hope I shall see the time when this subject of food in all its various phases, from the chemistry of its formation to the physiological changes in its effects, shall be a science by itself, and taught in all our schools made a leading feature of the curriculum.

A beginning has been made in this direction by the teaching of cooking in our public schools. For seven years classes have been successfully conducted in Boston in school kitchens especially fitted for the purpose. New Haven, Providence, Phila­delphia, Pittsburg, New York, Milwaukee and other cities have followed in the good work. Recently some of our Massachusetts legislators are considering the question of introducing cooking into the high schools of every city of twenty thousand inhab­itants. Many objections have been urged against the teaching of cookery in the pub­lic schools—want of time that should be devoted to other studies, home the best place for such instruction, etc. But in many homes no such instruction can be given, for there is no knowledge of anything but the mechanical part, and often not the best of that; and where it can be given there certainly is no study that could be more effect­ively carried on by the combined and happy working together of the school and the home.

Girls should be taught the magnitude of this responsibility, and while they are still girls, for no one can tell how early in life it may be thrust upon them. The com­fort, purity and influence of the future homes of this country are in the hands of our school-girls. It is for them to determine, that out of the love-lit center husband and children shall go, not with the lagging step and downward look of disappointment, doubt and ill-regulated passions, but full of the sweet courage and hopes that spring from the noblest human aspirations.

It has been urged that cooking-schools only increase the work of the already over-worked housekeeper; that many new and costly utensils are required, and that the new dishes are too expensive, too elaborate, etc., etc. I admit that these objec­tions might well be raised if the teacher’s only aim has been to show you how to make novelties and unwholesome combinations, or to outshine your friends in your enter­tainments. But no teacher who is in earnest in prompting this reform would make these objects paramount. I have for a long time felt, instead of teaching my pupils how to prepare elegant dinners of many courses, and to compete with chefs and cater­ers, I should spend more time in teaching them to prepare the essential dishes per­fectly, and until they can do that to give no time to elaborate menus.

Cooking is only one of the duties of the housekeeper, but it is the most important one; for the body plays so important a part in this world that its preservation in comeliness and health is one of our first duties. But alas! How many of us allow its