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enabled the whole nutritive problem of the countryto be studied as never before by the best scientificbrains, and this surely is the most cogent argumentof all for the existence and maintenance of foodcontrol. It will enable the nation to retain theservices of their scientific food advisers. How

necessary this is the latest report of the Food (War)Committee of the Royal Society, to which we havealready alluded, is sufficient evidence. This con-cludes with the pregnant words: " The abovereport shows how very inadequate is our presentknowledge of the science of nutrition, and demon-strates the necessity of renewed investigations onalmost every point discussed in it." Sir AucklandGeddes recently remarked that the universities,through the professors of the various faculties, hadcontributed more fully to victory than any otherorganised section of the community, and he beggedmen of science in future not to remain dumb atcritical periods, but to come forward to help thecountry. It would be hard to devise a more

efficient medium for the vocal help sought thansuch a Royal Society’s committee. Professor E. H.Starling’s recent Oliver-Sharpey Lectures on theFeeding of Nations : a Study in Applied Physiology,were a luminous exposition of the results whichmay be thus obtained. Even the most cursory studyof these lectures should convince our legislatorsthat the scientific method will and must pay. Letthem only compare the debit and credit sides of thefood balance-sheet. The continuation in being ofan expert advisory committee at the Food Ministrywill serve to build up a body of sound data fromwhich the needs of the community may be accu-rately computed. Nor is this the only departmentoutside the Ministry of Health that needs such.expert advice. The fixing of a minimum wage is

ardently desired. On what basis should this befounded, the cost of living, the aesthetic conditionsof labour, the amenities of life, or the actual energyexpended ? Here is another problem which appliedphysiology should help to solve.

DEPOPULATION.

AN aspect of the reconstruction problem whichis gravely exercising statesmen is that of the main-tenance of a sufficient population to carry out anyprojects of reform which may be deemed necessary.Perhaps, in course of time, the National Birth-rateCommission may have some helpful recommenda-tions to offer, and meanwhile those who wish tolearn how the matter presents itself to a Frenchmanmay care to read a work entitled " La Natalite,"written by Professor Gaston Rageot,l in which hediscusses the economic and psychologic laws whichhave determined modern views as to the place ofthe child in the social scheme. It is his desire, hesays, " to dissipate some of the illusions whichenvelope the problem of natality," the principalbeing the belief that it is a simple one which maybe solved by particular measures such as the awardof premiums or the grant of allowances. Hisstatement of the position is philosophical, and hedisplays none of the special weakness to whichdebaters of- this subject are prone-an inabilityto realise that the demolition of an opponent’sargument by means of a triumphant reductioad absurdum does not, of itself, show thatone’s own case is any better. A low birth-rateis, he finds, associated historically with extremes ofcivilisation which are themselves incompatiblewith the existence of the family. It is natural, he

1 Paris; Ernest Flammarion.

says, for human parents not to concern themselvesabout their children. " Ce n’est pas la nature quiprotege 1’enfant, mais la societe." And society isfor each of us only an abstraction which becomesconcrete and living when it stands for" " la patrieen danger." To the French mode of devolution ofproperty, which has been held to discourage theproduction of large families, he attaches littleimportance, if only for the reason that in Englandfreedom of testamentary capacity has not preventeda fall in the birth-rate; its effects, too, have varied-it stimulated natality under the Revolution anddepresses it to-day. Summing up the variousfactors which he has dealt with at length heconcludes that " la fausse démocratie produit ledepeuplement," but he is not without hope ofbetter things.

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TRAUMATIC ADDISON’S DISEASE.

THE subject of traumatic Addison’s disease isdiscussed by Dürck,1 who reports the followingcase. A hitherto healthy man, aged 48, was caughtbetween a railway carriage and a revolving plat-form and had four ribs fractured. Apparentrecovery took place, and he was able to resumehis work in about six weeks, but a week later hehad to give up owing to weakness in the arms andlegs and palpitation. Bronzing of the skin of the face’ ‘and hands gradually set in and the muscular weak-ness increased. Treatment consisted in the adminis-tration of suprarenal preparations, and death didnot take place until about eight years after the acci-dent. The autopsy showed considerable bronzingof the skin of the face, hands, forearms, and externalgenitals, and apparently complete absence of bothsuprarenals with a healed fracture of the sixth tothe ninth ribs on the right side. On microscopicalexamination some necrotic fragments representingthe remains of the medulla of the left suprarenalwere found, while on the right side there was hardlyany trace of the suprarenal, but remains ofblood pigment indicated that a haemorrhage hadformerly taken place in this situation a long timepreviously. Tuberculosis could be excluded, andthere was no evidence of syphilis.

A CHILD-BEARING STRIKE.

THE insertion at the front of the most recentnumber of the M1mieh Medical Journal, which hasreached us, of a polemic against a threatened child-bearing strike in Bavaria is something of a portent.The author, Fritz Burgdorfer, a doctor of publiceconomy holding office in Munich, begins by calling.attention to the active propaganda at present beingcarried on in that city, directed towards a pre.vention of conception and an encouragement ofintentional abortion, leading up to a demandfor what amounts to a strike of child-bearers.This

" communistic " programme, Dr. Burgdorfer

tells us, assumes that the population of Germanyis at present too large by 30 millions, andthat since under present conditions the usualoutlets in the form of exported goods or emigra-tion are impracticable, the cry should be ’’ Nomore children!" " since even a wise peasantdoes not breed more cattle than he can feed.Largely attended public gatherings in Munichhave, we learn, been instructed in the systematicuse of conception-preventing apparatus, the instru-ments themselves being shown and their applica-tion described. Dr. Burgdorfer’s reply to all this is

1 Aerztl. Sachverständ.-Ztg., 1919, xxv., 73-81.

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to quote at length Parts 1 and 2 of the 1919 Blue-book of the Bavarian Statistical Office giving theofficial figures for the changes in the populationduring the period of the war, which is over. Theresult is, he truly says, extremely sad.- In place ofthe usual abundant excess of births over deathsthe effect of the last five years upon the Bavarianpopulation has been as if :

(1) One year and eight months long no marriages hadtaken place.

(2) Two years long no children had been conceived.(3) Three years long double the usual number of human

beings (excluding children under 5 years) had died.

The married couples in the country had not onlysubstantially diminished in number but theiraverage age had increased and their procreativeability was less. All in all, at the end of 1918 thebaby budget showed a deficit of roughly 400,000.Applied to the pre-war German Empire as a whole,of which the Bavarian population formed one-tenth part, the profit and loss account might beso stated: 800,000 marriages not made, 4 millionchildren unborn, 1’6 million military persons died,700,000 civil persons died in consequence of thehunger blockade-as compared with normal times.These massive figures, Dr. Burgdorfer thinks, speakof a situation so serious that the communistic

propaganda must be controverted at all costs. Atthe moment there are not too many children buttoo many adult men in Germany. A child-bearingstrike would come too late and produce itsmaleficent results two decades hence, when theywould be an anachronism. Any nation that practisesa one-child system is going to its destruction.His motto is " Work, Peace, and Order," in thebelief that " The greatest riches of any peopleconsist in the people itself."

METROPOLITAN WATER-SUPPLY RESEARCHES.

THE thirteenth annual report on the results ofthe chemical and bacteriological examination ofthe London waters for the 12 months endedMarch 31st, 1919, was issued last week and

presents some novel features, inasmuch as, arisingout of the events of the war, certain importantchanges have been introduced in waterworksprocedure. We gather from the observations ofthe Director of Water Examination to the

Metropolitan Water Board, Sir Alexander Houston,that the new methods of water purificationadopted will form the future policy of the Board.It is clear from the report that during the period ofthe war, and excepting temporary periods of unusualstress, the average quality of London’s water-

S’upply has been wonderfully well maintained,especially in view of the extraordinary difficulties,often of a cumulative sort, which the engineeringdepartment has had to face. Sir Alexander Houstonadmits, however, that it is disappointing to have topoint out that for the current year the New River,East London (Lee), and Chelsea bacteriologicalresults are the worst since the work was startedunder his control. The floods were responsible inthe first two cases, and as regards Chelsea, theworks " were asked to do too much in relationto the filtration area." The chlorination of the riverwaters has been continued, and this process, it isreported, succeeds considerably better than storageon the average, and is practically three timessuperior in its winter effects, when both the riverwater and the storage water give the least satis-

factory results. These statements are based on theresults of bacteriological examination (the B. colitest). The saving of coal by the adoption of thechlorination method as compared with the storagemethod is a very remarkable factor in the case.Chlorination further has an important deterrenteffect on the development of algae or other vegetalgrowths, often a source of great inconvenienceand trouble to water engineers. The Stainesreservoirs were affected with these growths, whichshowed prominently in the photographs taken ofthe suspended matter, but they rapidly disappearedwhen chlorinated river water was once more usedfor supply purposes. Again and again these reser-voirs were, during flood-time, heavily "seeded" "with growths, yet when the floods subsided andchlorinated river water was again the source ofsupply the growths vanished relatively quickly.It would thus seem to be the case that whenchlorinated river water is stored for only a shorttime there is no serious risk of growths, even iffrom time to time a reservoir water is usedwhich contains growths in great abundance. Thesewater researches have obviously involved muchwell-directed study and the progress reported isadmirable.

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THE DEATH OF LORD RAYLEIGH.

THE death is announced of Lord Rayleigh, inhis 78th year. Thus has passed away one who,from the boyish days of his senior-wranglership,had devoted his life, with fruitful results, to thesolution of problems of fundamental importance inphysical science. Director of the Cavendish Labora-tory at Cambridge, where he occupied the chairof experimental physics, he was led to studythe physical properties of nitrogen from varioussources, with the result that he found the nitrogenof the air slightly heavier than pure nitrogenobtained by chemical means. Could such a discoverybe made more fitly than in the Cavendish Labora-tory ? The residue which the great Cavendishobtained in 1785 after oxidising the nitrogenof the air by " sparking" proved ultimately tobe the factor which caused nitrogen in Rayleigh’sexperiment to be heavier. It was a heaviergas mixed with the nitrogen and subsequentlywas isolated in a pure state and called by Ramsay,from its inertness, argon. This led to the dis-covery of other gases in the atmosphere, andthe methods employed brought helium to light.In many other directions Lord Rayleigh carriedout investigations of both scientific and practicalimportance. His memoirs on sound, electricity, andoptics formed a series of scientific contributionsmuch valued by the Royal Society, of which he wasPresident in 1905. He brought about, also, valuablereforms in the teaching of science and in educa-tional methods generally. Physical science haslost one of its most distinguished exponents bythe death of Lord Rayleigh; he is succeeded in hispeerage by his son, Mr. R. J. Strutt, F.R.S., who isalso a leading physicist.

INDEX TO "THE LANCET," VOL. I., 1919.THE Index and Title-page to Vol. I., 1919, which

was completed with the issue of June 28th, is

published in this number of THE LANCET. We are

glad to be able to restore this pre-war custom,now that it is justified by a more liberal supplyof paper.