fast
of little but a roll and coffee is more healthful than one of several
courses. It is an old American idea that luncheon or supper may be
light, dinner varied and heavier, but breakfast must be wholesome and
nourishing. This is based on the belief that it is natural for man and
beast to wake up in the morning with a desire for food and unnatural to
try to do the hardest work of the day with but a pretence at eating.

About twenty years ago there was much talk of the alleged healthfulness
of going without breakfast entirely. For a time this plan was the object
of much discussion and experiment by medical and scientific men and
workers in general. The late Edward Everett Hale was a strong opponent
to abstinence from breakfast by brain workers, while those who labored
with hand and muscle looked with little favor on the morning fast.
Finally the no-breakfast idea went the way of most fads in food.

As a compromise between the extremes of going without any breakfast, and
the old-time, over-hearty meal of several courses, there came into
fashion the simple meal of fruit, cereal and eggs. This is to be
commended, if the egg, or its substitute in food value, is not omitted.
Too often a sloppy cereal is washed down rapidly with a cup of coffee
and called sufficient. Sometimes the ready-to-eat cereal and the milk
bottle left at the kitchen door include the entire preparation for the
morning meal.

The adaptability of this quick breakfast, and its ease of preparation,
keep it in favor, but filling the stomach with a cereal, from which
some of its best elements have been taken, means, for women folks at
home, placing the coffee pot on the range to warm up the cup that will
stop that "gone" feeling so common after a near-breakfast. The man at
work might once have found solace in a glass of beer; now, perhaps, he
smokes an extra cigarette. It is well understood that children grow
listless and dull before noon, when an insufficient breakfast is eaten.
One who has breakfast leisurely at nine o'clock may be satisfied with a
roll and a cup of hot drink, but a commuter with a trip ahead to office
or shop, and the farmer who must make an early start in the day, cannot
rely on light, quickly digested food in the morning. Their energy and
working capacity will slow down long before noon.

Objection is sometimes made to a good, sustaining breakfast because of a
distaste for food in the morning. In such a case, look to the quality or