It has been slowly dawning upon some minds for half a century at least that kitchen methods in many of their details fail to meet the requirements of sanitary science. The ordinary cook does not even suspect what cleanliness means from the laboratory point of view; neither, alas! does her mistress, in the case of 90 per cent. of middle-class housekeepers. Both alike cheerfully ignore the relative value as cleansing agents of boiling as compared with "scalding" water; and refer to the broad shoulders of the weather or, quite frankly, to bad luck, the waste of food directly attributable to ignorant and uncleanly methods in market, purveyor's cart, or scullery. Yet no valid excuse can now be offered for ignorance of the real causes of the souring of milk, the tainting of meat, or the decay of vegetables; neither is it permissible to entrust to the untrained the care of larder and refrigerator, except under intelligent supervision. It is of course a sign of progress that the modern housewife prides herself upon the delivery of the daily milk supply in bottles. But a quite superficial acquaintance with bacteriology would show the imperfect character of such a protection. The milk may still be poured by the cook from the unwashed mouth of a bottle, grasped, even if but momentarily, by the hand of a milkman, which shortly before was caressing his horse or serving him as a substitute for a pocket-handkerchief! When the numerous uses of paper in the kitchen are considered, the advantage of a scientific acquaintance with its constituents and absorbent properties should hardly need emphasis. But the _laissez-faire_ attitude, common in many households, permits newspaper or brown-paper bags of questionable antecedents to be used indiscriminately for the lining of cake tins or the draining of fried foods. Should this be tolerated any longer?