ings, as the bran of rice and wheat, contain an element which is very activating in growth and nutrition but minute in amount, the nature of which has not been fully established. Funk gave to this practically unknown principle the name of vitamin. It has long been a common observation among farmers that stable manure promotes growth to a degree much greater than would be expected from the analysis of this product. Stable manure contains a vitamin so far as vegetable growth is concerned. Milk, the bran of wheat and the bran of rice, are samples of animal and vegetable diets which contain a similar body. A dairyman will pay almost as much for a ton of bran as he does for a ton of cottonseed meal, although the cottonseed meal contains twice as much of the protein element as the bran. The bran evidently promotes the flow of milk and the health and vitality of the cow to a degree not warranted by a perusal of the analytical data of its composition.

In the practical application of this principle to nutrition we acknowledge the advisability of a varied diet. This does not mean that one should eat everything at every meal, but it does mean that the single article of food should not be continued too long, but should be substituted frequently by different simple foods in a state of natural composition when possible.

Science, which leads to knowledge, is the great promoter of human advancement and necessarily of human efficiency and there is no way in which its munificent effects are better manifested than in the studies which relate to the vital activities. A few years ago a formless mass of matter was not considered as of much importance. If it were a crystalline body its nature. could easily be determined and studied. But the very basis of living tissue is amorphousness. We have to

deal here with that class of bodies long known but only lately appreciated-colloids. Biochemistry therefore does not consist alone in the story of the fate of the food in the body and the building of the tissues, but in addition to this in the actions and interactions of large masses of amorphous material which compose the principal tissues of the human body. The laws that govern colloids, therefore, are an integral part of biochemistry. Fortunately, in the many vogues of chemistry the colloids have not been neglected. Forty years ago organic chemistry was the favorite branch of study, and wonderful progress has been made in our knowledge of chemistry through the practice of organic investigations. Following this came the era of physical chemistry, also pregnant with great results for humanity. Then came, in its turn, as a favorite of fortune the study of the chemistry of living bodies, and this in turn developed the importance of the colloid as a fundamental condition of organic life. In all these fields chemistry has given notable contributions.

We are now on the threshold of a new movement, namely, the conservation of life and efficiency. In this movement chemistry has taken and will continue to take a leading part. Through the schools, the newspapers, the magazines, the rostrums and the pulpits of the country, the doctrine of efficiency will be preached as a concept of patriotism. We shall see, as a result of the application of these studies, a better race than ever before. We will see the lives of infants saved, the growth of children promoted, and the efficiency of the adult established.

The proper nutrition of a nation is necessary not only to develop its highest efficiency, but in times of stress, and especially war, the feeding of the army is a matter of the utmost consequence. Napoleon said:

"Soldiers fight on their bellies." It is useless to provide munitions of the highest type, rifles and cannons of the best make and the largest caliber, if at the same time the soldier who is to use these things is starving.

In the great war game which is now going on there is more discussion of the probable lack of food than there is of the actual lack of munitions. The great struggle will probably not be decided on any battlefield either on land or sea. Those nations which are best fed, and whose food supply is best assured, in the end are likely to prove the victors. There is no horror of a battlefield which is at all comparable with the horrors of famine. A nation can withstand successfully the demands of a faction that would make peace honorably or dishonorably, but no nation can withstand a universal cry for food. No government could persist which would, by striving to prolong a state of war, starve a whole nation. The great battle and the final victory will therefore not be fought in Europe, nor upon the seas, but in the wheat fields and maize fields and pastures and grazing lands of the whole world. Germany has shown a remarkable degree of practical wisdom in not only controlling the traffic in foods, but in educating the people to the greatest economy in their use. The tenets of biological and physiological chemistry have been put to a practical test of efficiency in the instructions which have been given the whole German people regarding the fundamental principles of proper nutrition. It is not wholly the abundance of food; it is the balancing and scientific use of food which best nourishes a nation. In fact, a superabundance of food may not be a blessing, but a threat, to a nation. My own observation leads me to believe that among the ordinarily well-to-do people of the United States excess in the consumption of food is a greater threat to

our health and long life than a shortage of the food supply would be.

What is needed particularly in the propaganda for scientific nutrition is less theory and more fact. The country is flooded with theories of nutrition. Hundreds of diet cards are constructed from various points of view as a proper adjustment of foods to physical wants. The fact of the case is that scientific nutrition of man is still in its infancy in this country, and if we were engaged in a world struggle and it were necessary to economize and husband our food supply and utilize it in a most efficient manner, we could not, as Germany has done, send into all parts of the country teachers of diet armed and equipped with a scientific training. In fact, in so far as the propaganda for food efficiency is concerned it is rather in the hands of the unskilled, and sometimes the conscienceless, than in the hands of trained nutritional chemists. Our newspapers and magazines have been flooded with advertisements of the cure and prevention of disease by different kinds of food which have been essentially of a nostrum, patent-medicine character, and which have resulted in some cases in fraud orders issued against the propagandists. The medical profession, I am sorry to say, has been very imperfectly trained along these lines, and the prescriptions for foods given by physicians would be laughable if they were not so pathetic and dangerous.

As a means to our highest efficiency the teaching of the correct principles of nutrition, based upon the facts of actual scientific demonstration, is essential. First, it must be done in the higher institutions of learning. Gradually must it reach even the primary schools. If we are to assume a position in the ranks of nations which will command respect, and if necessary fear, the

efficiency of our people must be brought to the maximum in order that the efficiency of our national defense may reach the same position. I speak particularly at the present time of the efficiency in the military service, but only because of the circumstances of the present time. That which makes for the highest efficiency in military service also affords the foundation for the highest accomplishments in all lines of human endeavor. A properly adjusted diet from infancy to old age will give to each one of our citizens, and hence to the nation, the greatest ability to make progress in all the arts of peace as well as to stand the shock of all the ravages of war.