Bread of some kind was made and used by the Egyptians, long before the Christian era.

Bread is mentioned in the Book of Genesis, and for thousands of years has been the staple food of many nations, especially the peasant element.

The Greeks and Romans made several varieties of bread. History tells us of at least 60 different kinds that were made by the Greeks.

The leavened bread is far more palatable than the unleavened bread, which is still a universal food among some of the primitive nations of today. It is supposed that leavened bread was discovered by accidentally working into a mass of dough a piece of old dough, several yeast spores having developed in this dough, causing the whole mass to expand and become light when baked.

However, I would not advise anyone to try this method, as it would make a bread which would be coarse and sour. Our dainty palates will only tolerate the best of bread.

The old method of simply mixing flour and water together has been done away with. Experience has taught us that doughs are made light by means of gas, which, by its expansion, forms a spongy, porous mass.

We have, besides soda and cream of tartar, yeast, which is used mostly in the making of bread. It is a tiny one-cell plant.

These small yeast plants require for their growth moisture, oxygen, some nitrogenous matter, salts, carbohydrates and some sugary substances, and a temperature of about 75 to 80 degrees, Fahrenheit.

Yeast is inactive at a very low temperature, and is killed at too high temperature.

The yeasts most commonly used are: Liquid, dry, and compressed. Liquid yeast is usually made in the home from potato water, with a little salt and sugar added to it and a few hops, and then allowing it to stand in a fairly warm place for a few days.

Dry yeast is sold in boxes. It will make good bread, but requires a longer time than the compressed yeast.

Compressed yeast, the kind most commonly used, is manufactured from the scum which rises on the surface of fermenting liquids. It is washed through several waters to re move all coarse particles, then pressed into cakes and wrapped in tin-foil.

One cake of yeast is supposed to contain about sixty billion yeast cells.

The essential ingredients of bread are liquid and flour, which should be rich in gluten. When the yeast is added, chemical changes will take place. The most important will be the changing of most of the starch of the flour into sugar and the changing of the sugar into carbon dioxide.

During the process of baking, the yeast spores are killed. The starch grains burst and are thoroughly cooked and the browning of the loaf changes some of the sugar to caramel.