The process is slow, and in the action some of the natural sweetness of the flour is lost.

In what is known as aerated bread, the gas made was forced directly into the dough, by means of a machine invented for the purpose; and a very scientific and very good bread it is.

But it demands an apparatus not to be had save at great expense, and the older fashions give a sufficiently sweet and desirable bread.
_Rye_ and _Indian Corn_ form the next best-known varieties of flour in bread-making; but barley and oats are also used, and beans, pease, rice, chestnuts, in short, any farinaceous seed, or legume rich in starch, can fill the office.
_Oatmeal_ may take rank as one of the best and most digestible forms of farinaceous food.

Some twenty-eight per cent of the grain is husk, seventy-two being kernel; and this kernel forms a meal containing twelve parts of nitrogenous matter, sixty-three of carbo-hydrates, five and a half of fatty matter, three of saline, and fifteen of water.

So little gluten is found, that the flour of oats can not be made into loaves of bread; although, mixed and baked as thin cakes, it forms a large part of the Scotchman's food.