I am aware that many professional men entertain a very different opinion on this subject, and speak of unleavened bread as being less nourishing and less easily digested. This may be true to a limited extent, in special cases of impaired and debilitated alimentary organs; but I am confident that as a general fact the notion is entirely erroneous. “The whole people of Asia,” says Dr. Cullen, “live upon unfermented rice. The Americans, before they became acquainted with the Europeans, employed, and for the most part, still employ their maize in the same condition. Even in Europe, the employment of unfermented bread, and unfermented farinaceæ in other forms, is still very considerable, and we are ready to maintain that the morbid consequences of such a diet are very seldom to be observed. In Scotland, nine tenths of the lower classes of people—and that is the greater part of the whole—live upon unfermented bread and unfermented farinaceæ in other forms, and at the same time, I am of opinion that there are not a more healthy people anywhere to be found. We give it to all classes and both sexes with advantage.” It is incontestibly true, that if two portions of the same kind of wheat meal be taken and made, the one into unleavened and the other into leavened bread, and both be eaten warm from the oven, the leavened bread will prove much more oppressive and difficult to manage in the stomach than the unleavened. But aside from the changes that are produced by the process of fermentation, there are many other considerations why unleavened bread of a proper quality and age, is better adapted to sustain the alimentary organs and general constitution of man, in their highest and best condition. Nevertheless, it is very certain, that loaf or raised bread can be made so nearly in accordance with the vital laws and interests of our bodies, as scarcely to militate against them in any perceptible or appreciable degree. And when I say this, I mean not merely its effects on the health and longevity of a single individual, but its effects upon the human constitution, through successive generations, for a thousand years or more. As a general criterion or rule, then, in regard to the character of bread, we perceive that the most perfect loaf or raised bread, is that which, being made of the best material, is light, and sweet, and well baked, and still most nearly retains all the natural proportions and properties of the original material. MATERIAL OF BREAD. Wheat. Extent of climate favorable to it. Injured by improper tillage. Removal of impurities. Washing of grain. Separation of the bran from the nutrient particles improper. Ancient Roman bread. Public bakers. Use of bad flour. Adulterations. Poisonous agents used to disguise them.