THE health, strength, and character of plants, animals, and men depend mainly on two factors, on heredity and nutrition. Plant breeders and animal breeders, observing carefully the effects of heredity and of nutrition, have achieved veritable miracles in improving the productions of the vegetable world and of the various breeds of animals. They have converted stunted grasses into wheat yielding prolific crops. They have changed worthless crab-apples into magnificent dessert fruit, dwarf roots and tubers into gigantic ones full of nourishment, etc. According to ancient sculptures and pictures the horses of Greece and Rome were only about as large as donkeys. That may be seen from the Parthenon Frieze at the British Museum on which the Athenian Cavalry is depicted. The Athenian dwarf horse was adopted as the mount of St George on our sovereign piece, for the feet of the rider hang down far below its belly. On the very realistic Dutch pictures of the 16th and 17th centuries also we find dwarf horses and ridiculously small cattle. The extraordinary successes of observant but unscientific agriculturists in improving plants and the strains of domestic animals beyond belief, justify us to hope that we may achieve similar results in improving the health and strength of the human race.

Heredity and nutrition are the great factors which determine the health and strength of men. Sexual selection, if guided mainly by instinct, by love, automatically makes for the improvement of the race, for beauty and strength are the greatest sexual attractions. That may be seen in the mating of all animals, birds, and even insects. However, while men, guided by the wonderful law of sexual selection, are striving to improve the race from generation to generation, they counteract the law of racial improvement to a very large extent by mistaken nutrition.

Nutrition is an all-important factor in developing the health, strength, and character of plants, animals, and men. Every gardener knows that certain plants want certain soils, and that they decline, sicken, and die if

planted in the wrong soil. Every gardener also knows that over-manuring, over-feeding with concentrated food, is deadly. Fresh air is undoubtedly very important, but right food seems vastly more important to men and animals. Animals living in the wilds preferably sleep in burrows, dens, caves, etc., which gives them warmth but little fresh air. African negroes, Asiatic natives, Eskimos, and other primitive men of excellent physique usually sleep in the stifling air of ridiculously small huts to which there is no ventilation. The magnificent Irishmen and Scotsmen of the past were largely raised in tiny evil-smelling shanties. Even our domestic animals shun the fresh air when asleep. Cats, dogs, and other animals curl up and press their noses into their fur, and they like best sleeping in confined quarters, for instance, under a low cupboard, out of the reach of draughts and of fresh air.

While animals and primitive natives disregard fresh air to which we attach rightly very great importance, they are exceedingly conservative in the selection of their food. Most animals rigidly adhere to their custo- . mary diet. The most daintily fed cats will kill dirty rats, mice, and birds, and will eat them, fur, bones, feathers, and all. Civilised man is the only animal which readily throws to the winds ancient tradition with regard to food. Civilised man, in selecting his food, merely consults his palate, and he surrenders his critical intelligence to the persuasiveness of cooks, food manufacturers, and food manipulators of every kind. He does not take enough trouble about the food he eats.

We know quite well that the over-refined foods and the unhygienic ways of civilisation are disastrous. We should never dream of raising horses on white bread, sugar, and cooked food, nor should we dream of increasing the strength of horses by feeding them on concentrated, strengthening food, while leaving them without exercise. The magnificent race of fleet horses of the present has been produced by plain, natural feeding, combined with hard physical work. We live on overrefined food, although we know that the kind of food we eat is inappropriate and is disastrous to our animals, and we add to it an abundance of salt, pepper, mustard, sauces, sugar, etc., which, also, we would not give to our animals, knowing that it would be harmful to them.

Besides, no animals, except a few depraved ones which have lost their natural instincts by a long association with man, will eat pungent pickles, sauces, etc., nor will they touch over-sweet food or hot food. A starving cat or dog will refuse milk, soup, or solid food at the extreme temperature at which we consume these habitually.

The idea that food gives strength and health is deeply implanted in the human mind. Since the earliest ages scientists have endeavoured to solve the mysteries of nutrition, and have striven to discover those factors in food which principally supply health and strength. The food of the gods is to be found in the folk-lore of all nations and in all popular religions. Hippocrates and other writers of antiquity were keenly interested in the science of nutrition, and they endeavoured to create concentrated foods by boiling and reducing milk, meat, vegetables, etc. The science of chemistry endeavours to find out what parts of the food provide us with health and strength. Liebig first analysed food-stuffs of every kind, and came to the scientific conclusion that the principal elements of all food were proteins, carbo-hydrates, and fats; in his opinion the animal proteins were the most valuable elements of all, were the true body-builders, and were derived from the similar substances in plants.

Thus the modern ideas of scientific feeding arose. Protein was thought by Liebig to be necessary for muscular work. Men were to be given health and strength by feeding them on meat, eggs, cheese, and other food-stuffs rich in protein. The food elements apart from protein, carbo-hydrate, and fat were disregarded, but were recognised by physiologists to be the essentials for muscular work and energy. The mineral substances contained in our food were not then particularly noticed and were simply called 'ash.' Ash is present in all natural foods and was for the time not deeply considered. The Liebig school spread its ideas to the universities and colleges all over the world. Medical men in those days were brought up in accordance with Liebig's nutritional doctrines, and very naturally the public and the writers of cookery books accepted the Liebig idea. The fact that carbo-hydrates and fats were the essentials for muscular work was omitted and hidden from the public.

The doctrine that our food consists of protein, carbohydrate, fat, ash, and water was preached for a great many decades and became the guiding doctrine of civilised men all over the world. This doctrine was put to the proof by a distinguished chemist about 1912. He fed animals on chemically pure proteins, carbohydrates, and fat with added ash and water, and discovered to his amazement that the unfortunate animals, instead of flourishing on this scientific diet, languished, and died very speedily. The theoretically excellent diet proved deadly.

These experiments showed that the current knowledge was insufficient. It was discovered that the scientifically fed animals recovered miraculously if they were given a trifling quantity of plain natural food, such as milk or meat. A little natural food saved the animals experimented upon from inevitable death. Further experiments were made, and it was found that the withholding of certain natural food-stuffs led to certain clearly marked diseases which henceforward became known as deficiency diseases.

These

It thus became obvious to those engaged upon the study of nutrition that, apart from proteins, carbohydrates and fats, ash and water, there must be food elements of absolutely vital importance to the body, the existence of which had been overlooked. obscure substances were given the name Vitamins, and chemists all over the world are trying to isolate them. Modern chemists refer generally to only three vitamins, but natural foods, as distinguished from chemically pure foods, may contain four or more vitamins. The body is a very wonderful and very mysterious machine, and the appliances of the chemist, and even the ultramicroscope, do not yet reveal all the mysteries. It has been discovered that certain food substances which contain no vitamin can be made to possess one of the vitamins by exposing them for a little time to the sun or to certain rays of a special lamp.

The modern biological chemist has enlarged upon the scientific knowledge of his predecessors. For the moment instead of experimenting with test tubes and various instruments and machines, he must experiment with animals whose bodies react to the as yet unisolated

vitamins. Soon this will no longer be necessary as tests for the vitamins are discovered.

As previously stated, food was found to contain protein, fat, and carbo-hydrate and a mineral residue generally called 'ash.' Analysis of this despised ash revealed the extraordinary fact that it contains a large number of minerals which, by way of the earth, the fodder plants and the animals living on them, reach men no matter whether men live on a vegetarian diet or on a meat diet. Moreover, it was found that the ash of the human body contains similar minerals, and that these minerals are as indispensable to the human body as are the recently discovered vitamins.

The chemistry of nature is far more wonderful than the chemistry of man. The humblest plan can create out of earth, water, and sunlight, substances which the chemist with all his wonderful instruments cannot create. Nature has carefully hidden from us the fundamental secrets of life, and we sin against Nature by trying in our vanity to improve upon the wonderful processes which may be hidden from us to the end of time. The object of Science is to find out how Nature does her work. It is a hard problem and will still take years of work.

Until comparatively recent times men lived on the food natural to them, which means on the food which the experience of countless ages had approved of as the best, or to which the human body had become adapted in the course of ages beyond counting. Then the cook and the manufacturer came along and tried to improve upon these traditional food-stuffs, the consumption of which had been accompanied by the physical and intellectual advancement of mankind, and endeavoured to give us health and strength by foods evolved in the factory of the food manipulator.

Until recently bread, made from various grains, had been the staff of life. Bread in every form consisted of coarsely ground grains. With the assistance of modern machinery, millers and bakers produced white flour from which the outer skins and the germ had been removed. The outer skins of grain of every kind contain the precious vitamins and mineral substances which are indispensable elements in building up the body, and the