The Milan exchange. (Milan, Gibson County, Tenn.) 1874-1978, 1875-01-14
Eggs as Food.
BY ALEXANDER HYDE.

BY ALEXANDER HYDE.
We made few suggestions in last
weeks Times upon milk as food for The
farmers family, and have been requested
TO follow up this train of thought. An
other article of food which farmers raise in
abundance, but which we fear they raise
TO sell rather than consume, is eggs. we
once heard the wife of dairy farmer conl-
planning that she was not allowed all the
cream and milk she wanted in the family.
because milk and cream were the staples
upon which he relied for his income.
Eggs arr a minor source of profit in most
farming establishments, but they furnish a
very convenient medium OF exchange for
tea and spices, so that the same principle
which causes the shoemaker's wife to go
without shoes. operates on the farmers
wife to deprive her of just allowance OF
eggs. These furnish just as wholesome
! and nutritious food in the farmers family
as they do in that of the merchant or me-
chanic, and we are confident that if farm
ers fully understood how much nourish-
ment was compactly slowed away in an
eg9-shell, they would sell less poultry
| fruit" and consume more. The exchange
| OF eggs for tea and spices is most uneven
exchange, as far as the support OF the iaml-
| ly is concerned, and still we have heard
many farmers say that they could not al
ford to make a market for their eggs at
home. A little examination of the chem
istry of the egg will dispel this delusion.
The average weight of hens egg is
about thousand grains, of which the shell
forms about a tenth part. The balance is
clean and clear food. DIR. Nicholas, in his
''Chemistry of Hens Egg" says: "A
raw or soft-boiled egg is OF all varieties OF
| food the most concentrated and nourish-
| ing" Like milk, it contains all the es-
sential elements for the sustentation and
growth of the animal. This must be so.
| for all the materials necessary for the for
nation of the future chick are inclOsed in
| the shell. Through this nothing enters to
| give form and life to the chick except air
and heat. Bones, muscles, skin, feathers,
cartilage, bill, every thing must be formed
! from the combined agency of white and
yelk. 1t seems miracle that living and
perfect animal can be formed out of such
apparently simple and inanimate master.
The little chick that picks his way out of
the marble prison in which, for three
weeks, the wonderful TRANSFORMATION has
been going on, will be found to have not
only carbon, oxygen, hydrogen and nitro
gen in his little corporation, but in his
| bones are phosphorus and lime, in his
feathers sulphur, in his blood iron, potash,
soda, ard manganese, and all these Or
ganic and mineral constituents he has de-
rived from the 800 grains Of semi-tluid
matter in the egg. Ii follows as night to
day that the egg must contain, in very
concentrated form, all the elements OF ami
NAL life.
The great value of the egg as food may
be inferred from its analysis. This shows
"a l.. g. -.
albumen, II per cent; oil or fat, l0.5 per
cent; mineral matter, 1.5 per cent; total,
100 per cent.
To one unacquainted with chemical
analysis, the water in an egg may seem to
be in excessive quantity; but lean beef
contains full as much, and. weight for
weight, the egg is richer food than beef.
So far as fat is concerned, the egg con-
tains three times as much as lean beet, and
is equaled in this respect among common
kinds of food only by pork and cells. The
fat or oil is wholly contained in the yelk,
the white consisting of albumen diluted
with water. The yelk also contains, be-
| sides oil and albumen, the mineral ingre-
! dents which go to form the frame of the
future bird, so that the yelk is really the
most nutritious part of the egg. But both
white and yelk were evidently designed to
! be eaten together, as the albumcn alone is
a cOnstipating kind of food, and requires
much fat to be eaten along with it to cOun-
teract this effect. Besides, the albumen
alone would not build up the whole body,
but only the muscles, being very similar
in its chemical composition to the tibrine
of beef. In cases of sickness it may some
times be necessary to reject the white and
use only the yelk, as this will at the same
eft trfh hn a a
| gentle cathartic.
DR.. Edward Smith, in his valuable book
on Food, in Appleton's International
/ Scientific Series,n says: 1t would not be
1 possible to eXaggerate the value of eggs
as an article of food, whether from their
universal use or the convenient form in
which the food is preserved, presented,
and cooked, and the nutriment which they
contain This is strong testimony, but
| DIR. Smith is high authority. 1t may be
! possible "to eXaggerate the value of eggs
as an article of food,' but we are confident
/ that the common estimation of them is far
below their real value; and we greatly de-
sire to dispel the too prevalent opinion
among farmers that eggs are a luxury
only to be INDUCED in by the rich, and
| that therefore they must sell the bulk of
their eggs, and use them in their families
only on Sundays and state occasions.
Let us examine this question of econ
Omy in the use of eggs little more par
| ticularly. A breakfast of eggs and toast
may not be quite as cheap as one of bread
and milk, but the difference in cost is not
great. No nation has studied the economy
/ of food more carefully than the French,
and Frenchman quite commonly makes
! his breakfast of couple of eggs, slice of
toast, and cup of coffee. The actual cost
Of such breakfast TO each individual in a
farmers family, including its preparation,
can not exceed six or eight cents; and
what can be cheaper, unless it Is bread and
milk? At restaurant, of course, it would
cost more, as the public caterer calculates
/ to make profit on all he furnishes his
| guests. and has rents and other expenses
/ TO pay before the question of per cent. of
profit comes in. But even at a restaurant
! such simple breakfast ought not to cost
over a couple of dimes. The eggs, on an
average, can be bought for two cents
apiece; three cents are ample allowance
/ for the toast, and three more are sufficient
for the coffee; and this will leave a dime
! for the caterers profits and extra eX-
penses.
The farmer may, however, say this is too
! light a breakfast. 1t may answer for a
student, but not for a laboring man. The
latter must have some salt pork and fried
potatoes - something substantial - on
which he can be stayed while working.
! This objection would have weight if eggs
were the light food, the whipt sillabub,
which they are thought by many to be !;
but we have seen that they are most con-
centrated and nourishing diet. If labor
ing man needs more nutriment, so that he
can follow the plcw all day, or pitch on a
load of hay in fifteen minutes, let him
double his allowance of eggs. There is no
law of physics or metaphysics which con-
fines farnler to one or TWO eggs for his
breakfast, but two eggs will furnish more
muscle than any two ordinary slices of
fried pork. Pork, which forms the staple
of so many farmers meals, has compare
| lively little fibrine in its composition. 1t
is mostly carbon-a heat-produciDg. not a
muscle-forming substance. We wish that
our farmer friends who think that eggs
are not animal food, and, therefore. can OF
sustain working men at their labors, would
try soft boiled eggs for their breakfast for
few DAYS and see if they cannot chop as