“Chicken, four and a half pounds, at twenty-two cents, including parcel post. I used to pay Dahlgren twenty-seven cents, so saved on four and one-half pounds, twenty-two cents. We three women have made arrangements with a certain farmer in Connecticut to supply us the year around with eggs, chickens and ducks. We have agreed to take a definite quantity each. He receives a little more than he would from the commission men, and we pay a little less than we would at the market. “These fine new potatoes were bought by the bushel, enough to last the three of us for the year. The farmer keeps them for us in his cellar and ships them, a barrel at a time. We paid him cash for our year’s supply of potatoes, at a dollar a bushel. We’ve been buying them here in New York at the rate of two dollars a bushel. So I saved fifty per cent. on the potatoes you ate. “Corn, at Dahlgren’s, sells at three ears for ten cents. Figuring up the contents of this week’s hamper, the corn I served to-night cost only a cent and a half an ear. “The tomatoes, lettuce, parsley and peaches all came out of the Home Hamper at half the price asked at a city market. Even those stuffed dates represent thrift. I used to pay eighty cents a pound for them at Dorlin’s. Lena stuffed these, and they are just as good. A pound of dates at ten cents, the same value of nuts, and a little powdered sugar. “Summing up the menu, it cost at least one-third less than it would have cost before I made my investigations. We must take into consideration, also, the better food value given for the money expended. There is absolutely no waste to the vegetables, which come directly from the truck garden to our table. Every leaf of lettuce counts; every bean, every pod of peas. In addition to the waste in fruit and vegetables, which lie from twenty-four to seventy-two hours on the docks or in commission houses, dry withered vegetables are not so valuable to the human system as the fresh vegetables. I am receiving two hampers a week now, and serving less meat, because Doctor Davis says that we do not need so much meat in warm weather, and we ought to make the most of the fresh vegetables and fruits while they are in season. “Twice a week Mrs. Norton, Teresa and I go to the city fish market very early and buy enough fish--that has been caught during the night and brought up the bay--to serve for two meals; first, boiled, fried or broiled, and then for luncheon or breakfast the next day, creamed or baked au gratin. When I buy meat I now know the economical cuts, how to get the most proteids for my money, so to speak. Just by knowing how meat is cut up, I have reduced my meat bill one-third. “These are actual figures. For nearly a month I have been transferring money from the envelope marked ‘Food’ to the envelope marked ‘Recreation and Improvement,’ I have charged up all the car fare, postage, etc., incidental to our adventures in thrift, and still have a good balance in favor of the investigation.”