"And close at hand the basket stood. With nuts from brown October's wood."

AS with fruits, so with nuts, there are many erroneous ideas and impressions, prevailing, regarding their dietetic usefulness.

For four or five thousand years the choicest, most healthful and most nutritious article of food that was assigned by the Creator for man's diet, has been but little used by the civilized portion of the world.

This non-use of nuts is all the more surprising when it is considered that they are the most nutritious and the most valuable of all the natural foods, taking first place in this respect. Nuts, fruits and cereals form a perfect and ideal combination of foods; leaving both meat and vegetables entirely out of the bill of fare.

Nuts are the vegetable counterpart of flesh-meats, and fare meat in the proper sense of the word, the original meat referred to in Gen. 1 : 29: "To you they shall be for meat."

A gross error exists in the minds of the public regarding the digestibility of nuts. This has probably arisen from two causes: First, that nuts are nearly always eaten under improper conditions : as a dessert at the end of a meal when quite sufficient food of this character has already been taken in the form of meat, eggs, peas, beans, and cheese, thus adding a double quantity, or excess, of proteid or albuminous food for the system to dispose of; or they are eaten as tid-bits between meals. In either case, if indigestion follows (which it almost invariably does) the nuts get the credit; secondly, nuts are usually insufficiently masticated. As a matter of fact nuts are easily digestible when properly eaten.

All nuts are digestible. Nuts of all kinds, almonds, filberts, hickory nuts, English walnuts, Brazils and pecans, by simple preparation may be made exceedingly digestible and acceptable.

In order that nuts may be thoroughly masticated, it is essential they be eaten at the beginning of a meal, replacing meat entirely, or in part. The mastication of nuts must be thorough, so that they are reduced to a smooth creamy pulp before swallowing. Where the teeth are at fault and one is unable to do the necessary grinding for himself, nuts may be used in the form of any of the nut-butters, which are simply nuts freed from skins, then crushed or ground into a paste by means of a mill. Unless nuts are thoroughly masticated, a large part of their nutritive properties is lost, passing through the system unabsorbed. One or two ounces of nuts are quite a sufficient quantity at each meal. The peanut, which belongs to the pea and bean family, and the chestnut, must be cooked because of the large amount of raw starch they contain.

Nuts are a complete and most wholesome substitute for meat of all descriptions, presenting the choicest and most concentrated nutriment of all food substances. They are a natural source of fat, affording it in great abundance and in a most assimable form. In nuts, fats are presented in an emulsified form, that is, as in cream. It is for this reason that nut-fat is so readily absorbed by the system. Cream and milk can be made from nuts, forming an exceedingly agreeable and wholesome food, agreeing perfectly with persons who cannot take cow's milk or cream to advantage.

Nuts contain on an average about 60 per cent. of fat, 25 per cent. of proteids, and about 12 per cent. of carbo-hydrates, thus having more than double the fuel-value or energy-power of meat. Protein and fat are the two most essential food substances for building fat and blood. Meat also supplies these principles, and it is for this reason that it occupies so high a place with the populace, as a food; but nuts supply these elements in far greater abundance and in a more nourishing form, than meats. Nuts may be deemed the vegetable counterpart of meat. Besides, nuts have this advantage over meat, they need no further special preparation. A walnut or an almond, if thoroughly masticated, is converted in the mouth into a creamy substance, not unlike in taste and consistency to the cream of milk. Considering that meat is three-fourths water, it will be noticed that nuts, pound for pound, are about one-fourth the price of meat.

The shells and skins of nuts should be removed. The almonds should be blanched and dried, or very slightly roasted. Shelled peanuts may be bought from fruit vendors, and gently roasted at home, as occasion requires. The roasting must be very gentle. Too much heat decomposes the fat in nuts the same as it does the free fat of meats, converting it into fatty acids, which are irritating, thus destroying their food properties. Of the various nuts the English walnut, the almond, filbert and the peanut are the most serviceable.

The peanut is, strictly speaking, a legume, after the manner of the pea and bean, and not of the nut family. Its composition is nearer that of nuts than legumes, containing as it does about 50% or one-half its weight in emulsified fat, besides 33% of nitrogenous or muscle making food.

Peanuts, when cooked, steamed and dried, or very slightly browned in an oven, are an exceedingly wholesome and palatable food, easily procurable and above all decidedly inexpensive.