A judicious housewife will first of all place meat on the fire, to have good soup and well-cooked meat. She will prefer beef to any other kind, because it contains but little fat and much albumen and animal fibre; for this reason it makes better broth, and still preserves strength enough to be a healthy, strength-giving dish. Besides, meat, by cooking, becomes more nutritive, inasmuch as its digestibility is greatly facilitated. One of the most important tasks of the cook consists in promoting one's digestion; in other words, in saving the stomach labor. Flesh in its raw state keeps its nutritive elements shut up in cells which are gluey. By boiling it, the gelatine becomes soft and mixes with the water; hence it comes that broth is glutinous, and, if allowed to cool, becomes thick and like jelly. This substance is in part very nourishing; it is often obtained from bones and cartilages, and then sold under the name of "bouillon-tables," which, when boiled in water, make a tolerably good soup. Thus we see that the first object of all cooking is the dissolving of the cellular tissues. Not before this is done do we obtain the real nutritive element of the flesh, which then is taken up by the stomach all the easier, inasmuch as it has thus been well prepared to be easily changed into blood. But before the meat reaches the boiling-point, albumen is separated from its surface and mixes with the water; it is this which gives broth its real strength and nutritive power. Afterwards, when the water boils, this albumen condenses; the broth becomes white, as if containing the white of eggs; from the inside of the meat flows continually more and more albumen into the broth, and makes it stronger and stronger. During this time, moreover, the fat parts of the meat melt, and its salts are also dissolved in the broth; hence a great deal of the most nutritive parts of the meat goes over into the broth; and although much of the strength of the meat has been withdrawn, still there is much of it left yet, and the meat has now become easier to masticate and easier to be digested. We need not add that a sufficient quantity of salt is thrown into the soup, which quickly dissolves in the water; but in the same degree that the meat excretes a part of its ingredients and gives them to the water, in the same measure does the meat absorb salt. By this it becomes not only more tasteful and digestible, but also more nutritive. It was not until recently that the importance of salt as a nutritive was recognized; this cannot be otherwise, for the tissues of the human body, as well as its blood and cartilages, need salt for their formation and support. Who does not know that every farmer gives his cattle salt from time to time, so as to improve their strength and general health?