W

IV

ASTE is a sin under even normal conditions. It becomes almost a heinous

sin in times of great stress like these. It is the duty of every Christian now to guard against it in every form. By so doing he may render a great service to his country.

The waste in the preparation of food is enormous. The food thrown away by the great hotels and restaurants of our country would feed hundreds of thousands. This has been so strikingly put in a leaflet recently issued by the National Emergency Food Garden Commission called "Food Thrift" that I quote from it here:

"American kitchens waste enough food each year to feed the whole British army in France and several divisions of the French army.

"It is estimated that the annual food waste in the United States amounts to $700,000,000. This is believed to be a conservative estimate. Therefore, all we need to do to make certain supplying all food required and of winning the war is to cut out that waste.

"It is entirely possible and feasible to do this. It is only a question of every man, woman and

child in the United States becoming individually thrifty in the use of food.

"The military leaders of our nation and of our allies agree that the outcome of the war is a matter of food. Thus every little food saving, trivial and unimportant as it may seem, adds to the aggregate of the food supply which can make victory certain. Without thrift at home all the outpouring of blood on foreign battlefields may be in vain. Famine may be the great conqueror and the war may end in a surrender forced by starvation.

"While hotels and restaurants are heavy offenders in the matter of wasting food, yet the chief contribution to the $700,000,000 food loss is made in the kitchens of private homes. Good food is improperly handled and stored. It is carelessly cooked. It is wastefully prepared. It is overgenerously provided. These are the chief causes of home food waste.

"Extravagant cooks must learn how to use leftovers. Left-over cereals can be combined with meats, fruits, or vegetables to make appetizing side dishes. Even a spoonful of cereal is worth saving as a thickener for soup or gravy. Don't throw away stale bread, skim milk, sour milk, scraps of meat or fish, trimmed fats or suet. Even the water used for cooking rice and many vegetables should be kept. Stale bread can be used in many ways, skim milk contains all the nourishing qualities of

milk except fat; sour milk can be used in baking; meat and fish scraps add flavor and nourishment to made-over dishes; fat can be tried out and used as a substitute for butter and lard in cooking; while cooking water will help to flavor soups and

sauces."

We all of us eat too much anyhow-eat twice as much food as we need for proper nourishment and eat many expensive foods that do not nourish us as much as cheaper kinds would. We have been living to eat, let us now eat to live. It will save millions of dollars. In the big cities thousands of people pay several dollars for a lunch or dinner in a restaurant. Enough money is spent in New York restaurants in one evening to keep the spenders healthfully alive for a week. This is wicked at such a time of crisis. Every man should spend just enough for the plain, nourishing food that he needs in order to do the best work. Thousands of dollars could be saved here and many more thousands of pounds of food could be preserved for the world. Luxury in food is a sin at this time.

Millions of dollars are being spent in drink. It is a waste at any time to spend money for that which does no one any good and works harm to thousands. Let every Christian labor to have these vast sums of money turned into helpful channels. If all the money put into drink this year were put into "Liberty Bonds," the two billions would be

floated easily-and more billions besides. In addition to this millions of bushels of grain are being used to distill liquors. Every Christian should insist that this grain be used for food.

Millions of dollars are being spent for tobacco. Whether a Christian should smoke or not is a matter for him to settle with his own conscience. But at this time when so many are starving in the world, and our own nation is perhaps entering upon grave perils, it is criminal to waste millions of dollars upon expensive cigars and innumerable cigarettes. If we must smoke, let us as a nation reduce it to a minimum and be content with most moderate indulgence.

Christian women also have a great opportunity to save millions to the nation by dressing in inexpensive clothes and hats. I looked into a shop window not long ago where about twenty hats were upon exhibition. These hats averaged twenty dollars each. I saw another window where gowns costing hundreds of dollars each were on exhibition. I am not an expert on either hats or gowns, but I do happen to know that some conscientious women are managing to look exceedingly attractive with hats and dresses costing only a fraction of what these hats and gowns were marked, and they are very happy in the consciousness of employing the large sums previously spent upon clothes to serve their country at this time.

Finally it is the duty of every Christian to

bend all his energies to increasing the food supply of the nation. How serious the crisis is, how necessary this service is, has been stated by the President himself. Remember his words:

"We must supply abundant food not only for ourselves and for our armies and our seamen, but also for a large part of the nations with whom we have now made common cause, and in whose support and by whose sides we shall be fighting.

"Let me suggest, also, that every one who creates or cultivates a garden helps, and helps greatly, to solve the problem of the feeding of the nations."

Every patch of ground should be utilized. Every spare hour should be put into cultivating it, if we have it. Let us get our exercise in gardening, exchanging our golf stick for a hoe. Set the children to gardening. Many of them will be quite delighted at cultivating a little patch of ground they can call their own. Let us save all the foods nature herself provides. Every Every apple, every grape in the woods, every berry in the fields, should be gathered, and what is not immediately consumed should be canned for winter use. Let those who live by sea and lake choose fishing for a pastime and save the meat bill and the meat for two

days a week. Gather the dandelions from the lawn, the mushrooms from the pastures, the watercress from the river. Let us make the earth yield double this year what it has ever yielded before. The following words from Mr. Charles Lathrop