Where expense must be carefully guarded, or where the condition of the family purse is such that conflicting demands must be intelligently considered in order to insure wise expenditure and the greatest permanent good of the many, it is well to remember that price is no guarantee whatever of real nutritive value. Two quarts of milk will furnish half the daily fuel requirement of our average man and the entire proteid requirement, while its cost is only sixteen cents. Reinforced by a pound loaf of wheat bread, the energy requirement for the day would be fully met, with surplus nitrogen to store up for future needs, and at an additional cost of only ten cents. A mixture in this proportion, however, would not be strictly physiological, since it is wasteful of proteid, but it may serve to illustrate the point. A better illustration is found in an admixture, quite adequate to supply the daily needs of our average man, both for proteid and energy, composed of one-quarter of a pound of lean beef, two-thirds of a pound of bread, and half a pound of butter, and at a total cost not to exceed thirty cents. The contrast of such prices with what is so commonly paid for table delicacies is somewhat striking; it could be made still more so by drawing upon many common vegetable foods, rich alike in proteid and in fuel value, the cost of which is even less than the simple food mixtures just referred to. It is not necessary, however, to enlarge upon this question; it is sufficient to merely emphasize the fact that the exaggerated demand of our present generation for dietetic luxuries is leading us far away from the proverbially simple life of our forefathers, and without adding in any way to the effectiveness of the daily diet. On the contrary, it is in part responsible for the high proteid consumption of the present day, with its attendant evils, and involves a large and unnecessary expenditure without adequate return. The wants of the body for food are far more advantageously met by a simple dietary, moderate in amount and at an expense comparatively slight. A recent writer,[78] in the “British Medical Journal,” a practitioner of medicine in the Highlands of Scotland, has said that these are “facts of common experience in the Highlands of Scotland, and probably among the peasantry of other countries also, where the old beliefs and customs have not too readily given way to the luxuries of civilization. Oatmeal in one form or another is a daily ingredient in the diet of a Highland peasant. The potato also is a staple food, and is consumed in large quantities with salt herring or other fish, and perhaps in some cases salt mutton or pork. Milk and eggs are used by most. The growing consumption of tea, however, and the increasing relish for sweets, candy, pastry, and biscuits, threaten to destroy the old way of living. A typical day’s diet for a crofter or fisherman who still believes in the traditional diet would be somewhat like this: