15. Reduction rolls 87 16. Baking test: loaves rising in incubator 92 17. Baking test: loaves leaving the oven 93 THE STORY OF A LOAF OF BREAD CHAPTER I WHEAT GROWING Wheat is one of the most adaptable of plants. It will grow on almost any kind of soil, and in almost any temperate climate. But the question which concerns the wheat grower is not whether he can grow wheat, but whether he can grow it profitably. This is a question of course that can never receive a final answer. Any increase in the price of wheat, or any improvement that lowers the cost of cultivation, may enable growers who cannot succeed under present conditions to grow wheat at a profit. Thus if the population of the world increases, and wheat becomes scarce, the wheat-growing area will doubtless be extended to districts where wheat cannot be grown profitably under present conditions. A study of the history of wheat-growing in this country during the last century shows that the reverse of this took place. In the first half of that period the population had increased, and from lack of transport facilities and other causes the importation of foreign wheat was small. Prices were high in consequence and every acre of available land was under wheat. As transport facilities increased wheat-growing areas were developed in Canada, in the Western States of America, in the Argentine, and in Australia, and the importation of foreign wheat increased enormously. This led to a rapid decrease in prices, and wheat-growing had to be abandoned on all but the most suitable soils in the British Isles. From 1880 onwards thousands of acres of land which had grown wheat profitably for many years were laid down to grass. In the last decade the world’s population has increased faster than the wheat-growing area has been extended. Prices have consequently risen, and the area under wheat in the British Isles will no doubt increase. But although it cannot be stated with finality on what land wheat can be grown, or cannot be grown, at a profit, nevertheless accumulated experience has shown that wheat grows best on the heavier kinds of loam soils where the rainfall is between 20 and 30 inches per annum. It grows nearly as well on clay soils and on lighter loams, and with the methods of dry farming followed in the arid regions of the Western States and Canada, it will succeed with less than its normal amount of rainfall.