Cookies, as the American cook knows them, are much alike in England, Scotland, Ireland, the Scandinavian Countries, and the Germanic Countries.

The American traveler looks about in other lands to find "Sweets" to supply the sugar he is in the habit of eating, and feels he must have, for the American consumes more sugar than the inhabitant of any other country. He can always find some sort of "Sweets" in whatever land he visits. They may not be entirely to his liking but they suffice, and frequently they are different enough to be in teresting. He may be offered a strange nut paste in Turkey, a rich fried cake in Spain, or he may even have to stoop to chewing pieces of peeled sugar cane if he happens to be in an island of the Pacific which is unfrequented by world travelers. But he must not expect to find cookies as he knows them unless he happens to stumble upon just the right nomad habitation in western Asia. If such a thing should be his good fortune he may find a woman baking cakes before the tent door, like Sarah of Bible times. The cakes will be made of whole wheat flour, salt and water, and baked on a griddle, as the women made and baked cakes for the Sons of Abraham. Or they may be a sweet cake, and if they are, tradition says they were brought into the land by the traders who wandered far into the regions of western Russia to trade with the Vikings. These cakes are so similar to some of the oldest Scandinavian recipes that the tradition must be based on facts.