"If that were the only effect of heat upon food," said Mr. Wilton, "we should be obliged to eat our food hot, for as soon as it cooled the cohesion would return and the food would be raw again. The operation of heat in cooking is various, and part of the effect is commonly to be ascribed to the water in which the food is cooked or to that which is contained in it. By the combined agency of heat and water starch swells to twenty or thirty times its original bulk and the minute starch grains burst open. In cooking potatoes the starch of the potato absorbs a portion of the water that is in it, and thus renders it dry and mealy. The action of heat and water upon rice, wheat, and other grains is similar to their operation upon starch. In the baking of bread the starch is converted into gum. In boiling flesh the effect is partly due to the solvent powers of water: the juices of the flesh are extracted, the gelatin is dissolved, the fat is liquefied, and the cells in which the fatty matter is held more or less burst, the albumen is solidified, and by long boiling the texture and fibre of the flesh are destroyed. The albumen of an egg, that is, the white, coagulates by heat. But in most of these processes the action of heat cannot be separated from that of water. "But there is another effect of heat very important both in nature and in the arts. What is that?" "The quickening of chemical affinity," answered Samuel. "That is right: heat is necessary for the operation of chemical affinity. Perhaps this is only a weakening of the cohesive force, thus allowing the chemical attractions to assert their strength. But the fact is that, while in many cases the chemical affinities act with great energy at ordinary temperatures, in other cases they slumber, however closely the substances are brought into contact, till their temperature is raised. Samuel, you may mention some illustrations of this principle."