9

to detract from the value of their researches for which nothing but admiration is,
possible. No work had been done in their time on the actual nutritive value of
Indian food materials, i.e., the amount actually absorbed from the dietaries—a
circumstance that clearly handicapped Lewis, and one to which he refers more than.
once—it is not to be wondered at, therefore, that the framers of diet scales should
make use of the only means open to them in their work, and base their stand-
ards on those diets which had been found successful in practice.

     The next paper to which reference is necessary is an extremely able article*
on, and critical review of, the subject of Indian jail dietaries by Major R. J.
Macnamara, I.M.S., in 1906. This report, submitted to the Punjab Government,
was to some extent the starting point of the present enquiry as, in transmitting it
to the Government of India, His Honour the Lieutenant-Governor of the Punjab
enquired whether the Government of India were disposed to extend the investiga-
tions to other provinces.

     In this very valuable report Major Macnamara deals more particularly with
the diet scales of the Punjab, which he considers to be much too high, and sug-
gests new scales of diet based on the work carried out by Dunlop on the Prison
Dietaries of Scotland.

     In so far as our investigations touch the food-stuffs in use in the Punjab we are
in absolute agreement with Major Macnamara, and we can heartily endorse his
remarks on the dietaries of the jails of Bengal.

     For the same reason, but to a somewhat less extent, this most valuable
report from other points of view, is not of much service in our investigations in
Bengal. It deals to a large extent with the theoretical side of the question and
with the framing of dietaries adapted to Indian jail conditions on the basis
of those found satisfactory in Scotland. It differs, however, in one important
particular from either of the papers already referred to, in that the diets on
which Major Macnamara has based his adaptations were worked out from the
standpoint of the actual nutritive value of the food materials, and not from their
gross chemical composition stated as so much protein, carbohydrate and fat. This
we consider is the only rational method of approaching the subject of the framing
of diet scales. It is futile to talk of the nutritive value of a diet—such as the
Bengal diet—as being superior to an English standard diet, because it offers 42
grains more nitrogen per man daily, if less than 60 per cent. of the nitrogen of that
Bengal diet is absorbed whilst 90 per cent, of the nitrogen of the English standard
diet undergoes metabolism in the system. It is because in India we are dealing
with classes of food-stuffs largely different from those in use in European
countries, and more particularly with very different quantities of any ingredient

* Notes on Indian Jail Dietaries with special reference to the Punjab by Major R. J. Macnamara,
I.M.S., 1906.