What is done with the peelings? For the most part, notably in towns and cities, they suffer cremation, either at the destructor, via the dust-bin, or in the kitchen stove. But potato-peelings constitute an expensive fuel. The rural resident is generally more thrifty. He throws the peelings into the swill-tub for pig-food, or husbands them to boil and to blend with grain offal to sustain his poultry-run, but the quantity thus turned to economic account is really an insignificant proportion of the whole. Quite 600,000 tons of potato offal are destroyed in ignorance during the year--a deliberate wastage of valuable raw material. The growers’ losses are equally startling, more particularly in clamping. The tubers afflicted with disease meet with instant rejection and destruction. Even the balance of good and sound tubers, remaining after the selection of the ware and seed grades, is utilized along the most wasteful lines, being regarded as fit for cattle only. The farmer is not to be blamed for such extravagant use of the proportion of his crop which fails to rise to the high standard set for the table. He has not been enlightened either in regard to the constitution of the potato or its potential industrial uses. Even if he be cognizant of these factors he cannot more profitably exploit his surplus owing to the absence of all facilities to such an end. Of what is the potato composed? Here is the result of an average analysis:-- Per cent. Fat 0.3 Cellulose 1 Mineral matter 1 Dextrine and pectose 2 Fibrin and albumen 2.3 Starch 17 Water 75 Waste 1.4 The term “waste” included in the above table in reality is somewhat misplaced, as I explain later. The starch content is also a variable factor. While one analysis may show a percentage of only 15, another will yield a figure exceeding 18 per cent. Consequently that quoted may be accepted as representative. Familiarity with the chemical composition of the humble potato prompted the Germans to regard it from two distinct view-points. The one, as in these islands, concerned its food potentialities; the second took into consideration its possible application as a raw material for several industries, such as the manufacture of alcohol, starch, glucose, dextrine, and other articles of commerce. Consequently, potato quotations upon the Teuton markets were dual and distinct. The one price, which was the higher, related to produce intended for the table, while the second, and lower, governed its industrial use.