capitalist had planned to avoid a similar fate by retiring at 65. Edison himself claimed to be working sixteen to seventeen hours a day-and on some days twenty hours while eating, as he insisted, only one-fourth as much as the capitalists mentioned. This statement may have been greatly exaggerated, or intended by Edison as mere persiflage, but it is significant that the great inventor is enabled to perform an enormous amount of work, even at his advanced age, by adhering to an abstemious diet. Upon those poor fools who boast that they go in for "a short life and a merry one" no words need be wasted. They will eat and drink what, when, and as much as they like, with no thought of anything except their immediate pleasures. Yet they should have our sympathy for two reasons: 1. Because, while they do not always die young, as they count upon, they generally begin to pay all too soon the penalty of their dissipation and then drag out a miserable existence which lasts all too long for both them and their families that are often burdened with the care of them. 2. Because, if they have children, as such persons generally do, the offspring are cursed by inheriting the bad constitutions earned by the parents. "The sins of the father," etc. There is a comic as well as a tragic side to the reckless medicating of all sorts of stomachs by the cook instead of the doctor. The adherents of various cults or sects which taboo entirely and condemn vehemently all drugs prescribed by physicians and obtained from the apothecary, never seem to balk at such powerful stimulant medicines as capsicum (red pepper), ginger, or the essence of horse radish, if only they are obtained at the grocery, called condiments, and prescribed and compounded by the chef or cook. Consistency, thou art indeed a jewel. We live now in a progressive period, and many of the evils which have been long highly respectable are in process of cure. Graft in our public servants is no longer condoned. Robbery of the people by dishonest combinations of capital is getting to be generally condemned. Drunkenness has ceased to be considered a mere venial fault. Excessive eating and drinking short of actual intoxication are still widely practiced and approved, but there are indications that the time is coming when it will be considered as disgraceful to be bilious or have acute indigestion (embarras gastrique of the French) as it now is to be drunk. When the people have learned how to eat sensibly and hygienically and, what probably will be still more difficult, have acquired the will-power which will enable them to practice enough self-denial to eat to live instead of living to eat; and also, after the present movement for the perfection of public hygiene and sanitation has succeeded in spite of the patent medicine interests and their dupes and fool helpers, things will be different in many ways. For one thing, there will be much less use for physicians, since comparatively few of them will then be needed except as hygienic guides and teachers. The apothecaries, too, will be mostly out of business except for the sale of soda water, perfumery, etc. This will be so much the better for mankind. There will be plenty of room for the displaced doctors and druggists in the productive occupations. The surgeons, however, are likely to be busier than ever as the multiplication of automobiles and aeroplanes goes on. But of all the persons to benefit by a radical reform in the eating habits of the world the most conspicuous will be the millions of housewives now engaged in preparing the meals and washing the dishes besides doing all the other work in the families that are unable to employ help. The boon to them will be immense. So far they have gained nothing from the labor movement which has cut down the daily stint of the male workmen from ten or twelve to eight hours or less. They must still prepare every day, including Sundays (which is now no day of rest for them), three big, hot meals, besides the tiresome cleaning up afterward, so that the men may be able to overtax their stomachs, when one generous warm cooked meal, with one, or, if necessary for the hardest workers, two or three cold luncheons in addition, would nourish them as well or better; that is, provided always they have normal digestive organs to begin with. These they would nearly always have, if they had eaten rationally and lived otherwise hygienically before. For dyspeptics specially arranged diets are usually necessary, though even for them a simple reduction of the quantity eaten with more thorough mastication would often be curative. The professional classes, and all those engaged in sedentary occupations especially, would be vastly better off if less tempted to overload their systems by trying, often with little or no appetite, to dispose of so many elaborate meals which lack of sufficient exercise makes largely superfluous and positively harmful. The remedy for overeating? The chief one is the same that Punch advised for those about to marry: "Don't." Self-denial is indispensable. Poverty also generally helps. The remedy for the consequences is another story and much too long to enter upon here. A good doctor is necessary in the more advanced cases at least, and the sterner he is the better. An important point is to know when one is overeating, one who is not given to manifest gormandizing. The specialists in these matters often prescribe weighed quantities of the chief classes of foodsof the proteids (meat, eggs, cheese, etc), carbohydrates (starch and sugar), fats, and mineral elements - all of which, in proper proportion, are essential to health. I used to give my patients the following simple rule, which, in most cases, obviated such a troublesome procedure: For a person not under weight and otherwise in good health, let the amount of food regularly taken be gradually lessened, meanwhile watching the effect on the weight. If this should be lowered by even a small reduction in the nourishment, there could not have been any overindulgence. If, on the other hand, the weight should remain the same, or even increase, as it sometimes will as a result of improved digestion, in spite of, or rather because of, a considerable reduction of the intake, it would show that previously an excess had been eaten. The cutting down process could, in such a case, be continued with advantage until there should be such a falling off in weight as might be undesirable for any reason. For one having an excessive appetite, the easiest way to restrict is to eat at a separate table till measurably cured. Having retired from active practice, I cannot be accused of mercenary motives in writing this article as a warning to the many persons who need it. Not a large proportion of them will be likely to heed it, and for some time to come there is no probability that my former medical colleagues will not continue to be kept as busy as usual in repairing the damage from overeating. INTENSIVE PROTEID DIET FOR WEAKLY CHILDREN AND INVALIDS. BY DR. MANUEL PARA Y GIL, New York. THE question of properly feeding backward children and the sick is more important than medication, and is now actively engaging the attention of the medical world. Our object should be to furnish such patients with a maximum of nutrition in order to compensate for increased tissue waste, but this is a matter by no means always easily accomplished. Carbohydrates and hydrocarbons (starches, sugars, and fats) are as coal to the steam engine, while the body tissues, built up from organized proteid (animal muscular tissues and nucleated protoplasm of vegetable cells), may be compared with the machinery itself. I shall not dwell on carbohydrates and hydrocarbon diet, since it is usually well borne and furnishes sufficient caloric for the economy. In the growing child constructive forces are more active than in healthy adults, who require only to replace the wear and tear of the complicated human machine, and ordinary food provides for both, although adults undoubtedly often overburden themselves with too much proteid and consequently tax the liver, respiratory organs, heart, kidneys, and skin unnecessarily to remove the overplus. In chronic diseases and during convalescence, however, it is a serious problem to rebuild new tissues and compensate for the additional waste going on. Such patients do not assimilate proteids as well as normal individuals, and a concentrated proteid diet which will not fatigue the digestive organs or give rise to secondary fermentations and toxic byproducts is very essential to any treatment. We must not expect to get a gain in weight until the dyspepsia has been overcome nor until the caloric requirements have been fulfilled. We will, therefore, consider how this can be accomplished. To obtain the best results we must give a concentrated assimilable proteid diet, in such a form that it will be quickly absorbed before fermentation can take place. This can now be accomplished with the addition of active lactic ferments. Entire asepsis of the gastric intestinal tract is out of the question owing to the large amounts of antiseptic agents required; besides, such a condition would inhibit normal digestive processes. The best of a number of known lactic ferments are the streptococcus lebeni and the streptobacillus lebeni, which have been isolated at the Paris Pasteur Institute from leben, a fermented milk food used for centuries in Eastern Europe, and especially in Bulgaria. These ferments can be taken by the mouth and gradually establish themselves as a part of the intestinal flora, giving rise to free lactid acid in situ, by which means the colon bacillus, gas-forming bac teria, and pathogenic organisms which flourish best in an alkaline culture medium (such as the intestinal contents) are controlled, proof of which is shown by almost odorless stools, a diminished indican output, and prevention of gas formation when continued for some time. We have, therefore, with these strong lactic acid-forming bacteria a practical means of controlling production of exogenous toxic as a result of undesirable fermentation within the gastro-intestinal tract. Whenever we have phosphaturia we may suspect a destruction of cellular tissues in excess of the normal waste out of proportion to the intake. Such phosphates are not only of exogenous origin, but indicate some cleavage of the nucleins from somatic cells, and such conditions must be met by increased nutrition. In order to build up new osseous and muscular tissues in the adolescent and invalid adult, where ordinary diet is insufficient or cannot be tolerated in sufficient quantity, calcium and other phosphates are only second in importance to proteid nutrition. Since we have learned the connection between calcium salts and the thyroid and other internal secretions, pediatricians appreciate their prophylactic and inhibitory influence against infectious diseases of childhood, and their importance in the treatment of rickets, Pott's diseases, adenitis (especially where there is a tendency of the cervical glands to suppurate) or form such foci of infection as psoas abscess, white swellings, and intestinal tuberculosis. These conditions often yield without surgical interference to this treatment, if given at the psychological moment in the child's development. With this object in view, calcium salts are indicated in association with a concentrated proteid diet. Inorganic phosphates of calcium and other cases are not assimilated as such in the physiologic proportions necessary to vigorous growth, but must first be converted into that critical chemical ionic condition which allows of them becoming a part of the albuminous substances formed by digestive processes. The futility of administering simple phosphates is now well understood, for, like flesh and grain, which forms the chief part of our ordinary proteid intake, they are not assimilated as such, and cannot become part of the complex molecular protoplasmic material of cells until they first form a loose compound or ester of glycerine with oxidized phosphorus known as glycerophosphoric acid. It is in this condition that phosphates exist in the nucleins of the cellular tissues of all animals. These glycerophosphates may be conveniently administered in connection with a concentrated proteid food; but even so, unless the gastric juice is sufficiently strong to convert the calcium and other glycerophosphates into acid glycerophosphates and render the ions free, they are almost as useless as the simple phosphates, and in weakly children and invalids provision must be made for this. We now come to the question of proteid feeding, and in considering this should remember the experiments of E. P. Cathcart (Jour. Physiol., October, 1909, xxxix, 311). This authority, in a series of dieting and fasting experiments, showed that the amount of creatin appearing in the urine might be taken as an indication of the condition of the protein metabolism. Benedict, as well as Cathcart, shows that creatin is a constant excretory product during inanition, and hence purely of endogenous origin. As soon as food is supplied creatin practically disappears from the urine. Carbohydrates, therefore, are absolutely essential for endocellular synthetic processes in connection with protein. metabolism. Resynthesis takes place in the tissues (muscles), and the greater part of the muscle protein tissue nitrogen which is set free as the result of the work does not appear in the urine, but is reutilized. The foodstuff which plays the most important role in this resynthesis is carbohydrate. It is a mistake, therefore, to give a purely proteid food, such as casein or concen trated albumins, and a combined proteid carbohydrate and hydrocarbon diet is preferable; moreover, it is unnecessary to administer a large amount of proteid, since small doses given regularly between meals suffice. Such treatment requires no argument, since it is truly scientific and a reasonable means of attaining the object sought, viz., increased assimilation and building up of reserve force without unduly fatiguing the digestive organs. To recapitulate, children are in the constructive stage with less reserve force than adults, and while an overplus of proteid is undesirable, they do require relatively large amounts combined with assimilated phosphates, not forgetting, however, the importance of the heat and energy-producing carbohydrates and hydrocarbons. The following comparison of proteid contents is of interest: Pea flour.. Chicken.... Mutton... Egg...... Macaroni.... ...contains 22.4% of proteid Fresh fish (average)... 66 66 21.0 66 13.5 Sago, tapioca and arrowroot.... From this table we see how difficult it is to give weakly children and adult invalids enough of ordinary foods yielding proteid elements in sufficient quantity to cope with wasting processes without unduly burdening their digestive organs. A suitable and concentrated proteid food to meet the foregoing requirements, having the following formula, has been suggested by Huxley, of London: Since the caloric value of such a food is only 36.20, it must not be considered in the same category as patent foods, composed of sugars and baked starches, but simply as a supplementary proteid diet to assist the patient in building up new tissues, and not as a generator of caloric and energy, which must be supplied by such hydrocarbons and carbohydrates as the patients can best tolerate. Such a formula does away with a cumbersome amount of food and can conveniently be administered, sprinkled on bread and butter. Owing to the presence of the potential glycerophosphates and the lactic ferments, it must not be heated. It may, however, be given in warm milk, or mixed in with soft diet. Best results, however, will be obtained by small doses of about a teaspoonful every hour or two, between the regular meals. By such prophylactic treatment weakly, pale children are better able to resist those critical periods in their lives when resistance is weakened and they are exposed to infection from measles, scarlatina, diphtheria, influenza, incipient tuberculosis, bronchitis, and the like. Convalescents and adults suffering from chronic diseases may be considered in the same way as children, and a concentrated digestible proteid food of this character becomes reconstructive, enabling patients to maintain a fair balance or gradually establish an equilibrium. It applies especially, therefore, to those suffering from Bright's disease, cancer, suckling mothers, and even to diabetes. No one will pretend that our so-called civilized society has a very strict practical morality, yet public opinion still seems to attach a particular importance to sexual morality, and this is the expression of a very real sentiment, the origin of which scientific sociology has no difficulty in retracing. This origin, far from being a lofty one, goes back simply to the right of proprietorship in women similar to that in goods and chattels—a proprietorship which we find claimed in savage, and even in barbarous countries, without any feeling of shame.-LETOURNEAU. PHYSICAL DEFECTS AS A FACTOR IN THE MAKING OF CRIMINALS. BY WILLIAM MARTIN RICHARDS, M.D., New York. WE today look back with horror on the penal methods of our ancestors, but doubtless our ancestors will look back with equal horror on ours. We congratulate ourselves that we no longer hang men for trivial offenses, and instead of ducking our wives when they scold, we now let them speak out their minds, and generally find there is some cause for their scolding. Is it not equally true that our descendants will wonder why people as sensible as we are in many lines paid so little attention to the physical causes of crime, and why we did not treat it as a moral disease, for, in the words of Taine, there is a physical cause for vice and virtue as there is for heat and cold. If we investigate thoroughly, I believe that we can find the cause which makes criminals different from our other brothers and sisters. In each case there must be some actual factor which produces these so-called degenerates, and which we can discover and remove if we only give enough time and labor to the investigation. Among my acquaintances is William. Evers, formerly guard on "murderers' row" in the New York City prison known as the Tombs, and now chief guard of the workhouse on Blackwells Island. He once said to me: "I was guard on murderers' row for twenty-five years, and have been dealing with criminals for twentynine years. Probably I have seen more murderers than any man in the United States, possibly in the world, and I have never seen a criminal who did not have some physical defect which, in my opinion, was the cause of his being where he was." No one who knows Mr. Evers would call him a theorist, or a crank riding a hobby to death. Of course, we all know there are cases of individuals who are triumphantly virtuous under the most adverse physical conditions, individuals whose moral fibre is of such strength that no suffering, |