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experts of admitted scientific and economic reputa-tion. Dr. A. D. WALLER, in his admirable critical in-troduction to this book, puts the case shortly thus :-"The total calorimetric values per annum as stated

by the Berlin committee are as follows: (1) With apopulation of 66’67 million heads (men, women,and children), you used for 1913 88’65 billion

calories-i.e., you would have used, with a

population of 68 millions for 1914, 90’42 billion

calories. (2) Your minimum physiological require-ment is 56’75 billion calories. (3) You shouldproduce at home normally 71’24 billion calories, orallowing for abnormal conditions a fall in produc-tion of 5 per cent., say, 67’68 billion calories.

(4) You can, by extraordinary measures of economy,raise your home production to 81’25 billion calories.These figures, 90’42, 56’75, 67’68, and 81’25 billions,reduced to values per head per day, come

out as follows : (1) You used for 1913-144779 cals. per man per day. (2) You require for1915-16 3000 cals. per man per day. (3) You willhave at home for 1915-16 3577 cals. per man perday. (4) You can have at home for 1915-164295 cals. per man per day. Therefore you will

pull through in spite of the British attempt to

outhunger you." In our abstract of this reportwe stated that it was clear that in manydirections considerable apprehensiveness existed,especially in regard to preserving under the con-ditions imposed upon the country by the war aphysiological balance of foodstuffs; and we addedthat there could be little doubt that Germanypossessed a great reserve of sugar-supply, and couldno doubt go on producing it. But there was anxietyconcerning the foodstuffs supplying the nitro-

genous tissue reparatives, in the form chiefly ofmeat, milk, and fish. Dr. WALLER remarks that signsare not wanting that even the imperfect limitationof food-supply brought about by the state of waris producing upon the health and strength of

Germany some portion of the effect that was to be I

anticipated. The upshot of the report appears tobe that the attempted and so-called hunger warof Great Britain against Germany can be defeatedby adopting measures of economy, and Germany 1

in that case cannot be starved. Dr. WALLERregards this as a hypothetical conclusion. The f ullfacts of the case are now available to the English c

public. Dr. WELLS’s English version of this charac- 1teristically painstaking investigation is admirablydone, and he has rendered a good service by inter- J

preting so ably this very remarkable economic and (

physiological computation. - : ’

1 Germany’s Food. Can it last? A Study by German Experts.Edited by Professor Paul Eltzbacher. English version edited byS. Russel Wells, M.D., B.Sc., with a critical introduction by A. D.Waller, M.D., LL.D., F.R.S. London: University of London Press.1915. Pp. 232. Price 2s. net. I

INAUGURAL ADDRESSES AT THE OPENING OF THE &iacute;WINTER MEDICAL SESSlf’x.&mdash;The winter session at Middlesex Hospital Medical School will begin on Friday, Oct. lst, whenDr. John Cdmeron will deliver the opening address. At ]the School of Medicine of the University of Leeds, which <

opens on the same date Sir William Osler, F.R.S., willaddress the students, 1

Annotations."Ne quid nimis."

AN ANATOMIST ON ETHNOLOGY.

IT is, of course, one of the oldest observationsin ethnology that extraordinary similarities existbetween the customs of races widely separatedfrom each other both by time and by geographical,boundaries. Travellers have recorded wonderfulsurvivals of the very oddest and most unnecessarydetails in these customs, and ethnologists havebecome accustomed to accept the great likeness inthe works of early man in different parts of the worldas a mere matter of course. As an instance we maytake the identity shown in the dsetails of some ofthe early American civilisations with similar detailsobserved in past or present customs amongstpeoples remotely separated from the Americancontinent. How is it that things so wonderfullyalike, things often trivial and unnecessary, crop upin outlying parts of the world among utterlydifferent races of mankind ? ?, Suppose, beforeattempting the answer to that question, we stateanother and an entirely different one. How is itthat so wonderful a similarity exists between thedetails of structure of, say, a monkey and a man ?To this last question we give an answer to-dayvery different from that given before the generalacceptance of the principle of evolution. But t&Ucirc;’the first question the answer current 60 yearsago, when knowledge of the human story waslimited to biblical teaching, is the answer whichstill holds good to-day. We have only to turn tosuch pre-Darwinian writings upon the similarityof American and European antiquities as thoseof Daniel Wilson and the slightly later ones ofDawson to realise how entirely hedged in bybiblical chronology the ideas of the ethnologist,were. In such writings as these the similarity in,human works to the instinctive exploits of the beeand the beaver took root so deep, that the beliefin its significance flourishes fresh and, green,to-day. It would probably astonish a modern

ethnologist to be told that his ideas upon his.own subject are enveloped in the same hazyatmosphere as that which surrounded the views ofthe zoologists before the advent of Darwin’s greatestwork. He would be surprised to learn that thelegacy of Genesis still trammelled all his thoughts,and the surprise would probably not be lessened’if this information were to come from one notin the ranks of the ethnologists. But it would’certainly seem that Professor Elliot Smith is tellingthese things to, the professed, students of ethnology,and telling them, too, in no unmistakable manner.*’In some ways the origin of any piece of work,.especially if the subject be somewhat out-side the regular beat of the student’s inquiries"is an important factor in determining the-value to be attached to the work. The originof this departure into ethnology by an anatomistis, to our mind, one of its strongest recom-

mendations. It was in the tracking of definitephysical anthropological features around the worldthat the trail of the curious customs embracedin the so-called " heliolithic " culture became so

1 On the Significance of the Geographical Distribution of thePractice of Mummification : A Study of the Migrations of Peoples andthe Spread of Certain Customs and Beliefs. By Professor G. ElliotSmith, M.A., M.D., F.R.S. From vol. lix , Part 2. of Memoirs andProceedings of the Manchester Literary and Philosophical Society.1915. Manchester: 36, George-street. Price 2s. 6d.

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- obvious that it could not be ignored. It is withthe many odd items in the make-up of this culturethat Professor.Elliot Smith is concerned. Having..already followed the evolution of tomb-buildingwhich culminated in the Pyramids of Egypt. and.having traced the influence of this cult in the

megalithic monuments of other parts of the world,a host of other customs prevalent in ancient Egyptwere found to occur in varying associations along,the track of the megalith. One of the most con-

spicuous of these. associated customs is the attempt- art preserving the dead body by some process ofembalming or mummification; and in tracingmummification into the remotest corners of the,earth Professor Elliot Smith appears to us to have,established his case beyond any dispute. Herewe are glad to see is the death-blow to all thosespeculations associated with what we may term the"" bee and beaver" period. There is not in this,often repulsive, business of trying to preserve the,dead any .inherent human instinct; it is a definitecult, and has been carried from place to place by.advance agents of the heliolithic ritual, its most;minute, and often unnecessary, details being per-sisted in in the face of the greatest natural,difficulties. Mummy-making in the dry climate,.of Egypt is a comparativeI-y,easy and not necessarilya very unpleasant business; and, moreover, its.natural origin in Egypt is easy to explain. Butthe preservation of the body in a damp tropical,land is a very different affair; it is not to beassumed that any human instinct dictated the-attempt in climes where decomposition is so dis-gustingly rapid ; it is only to be wondered at that,having received this ritual as part of a taught cult,.the natives of these places have persisted so long,in their attempts at a very beastly, and never

wery successful, business. -We cannot deal with thehost of points of corroborative evidence, and, indeed,,it is evident that Professor Elliot Smith himself,has been unable to bring into play a tithe ofthe available details which all point so certainly inthe same direction. It is enough to say that foranyone who is not a professed ethnologist the con-,elusion is quite unavoidable-these things havebeen spread by early human missionaries. The

- speculations which naturally arise are beyond- enumeration, but must suggest themselves to every-one, and must one day be answered. How far backmust we now place the dawn of the architect ?’ Is I- any of the work of man-the chipping of flint, theprimitive art of the potter, which manifests itselfin such similar forms-the outcome of the " bee andbeaver" " instinct ? Professor Elliot Smith hasopened up an immense field, and he has shownonce again that a vast mass of details may becollected and built up, and yet the very masons

Iengaged on the task may not see the form of the (edifice they are raising so clearly as one who’happens to pass by at some little distance from,the site of their labour.

"GHOSTS" ON THE CINEMA.

SYPHILIS has been described more than once in’lay literature, and with what may be considered- a very fair approximation to truth, though thereis no subject over which more blunders have beenmade by distinguished authors. Brieux has dealtwith the subject in Les Avariis, and, in moreromantic vein, Ibsen has given us what hedoubtless believed to be a typical account ofthe matter in his :great drama Ghosts. A private

representation of this play was given in their studiorecently by the Dominion Exclusives Company,a cinematograph company especially concernedwith productions of artistic interest. The setting,copied from the Norwegian originals, and theacting of the principal performers were excellent.The satyr-like chamberlain Alvius and his lucklessson Oswald were performed by Mr. Henry.Walthall,who gave a truly, tragic representation of theonset of general paralysis. It is an affair ofterror and pity quite in accordance with theAristotelian canon. But pathology, or rathermedicine, boggles at Ibsen’s doctrine and his art.Is it a fact, we may be permitted to ask, that anInherited Burden, for so the cinema play is called,is handed on in quite this tremendous manner?Paracelsus held Ibsen’s view, and the Scripturessupport it in many famous texts. It is a question,however, whether the transmission of lues, leprosy,and so forth is so inevitable and terrible. In a

recently discussed report from the bacteriologicallaboratory of the London Hospital evidence isadduced which goes to show that out of 1000 childrenof the artisan class only 2 were hereditary syphilitics,and of these one died early and the other showedsymptoms making it unlikely that he could liveto the age of the unlucky Oswald in Ghosts.Oswald’s case in Ghosts would seem to fall underthe heading

’’

Quaternary Syphilis," mentioned inthe last edition of Mr. C. F. Marshall’s well-knowntreatise on syphilis and venereal disease. It is a

question whether there are many such belatedcases. At least they are not typical, as Ibsen wouldhave us suppose. They are terrible exceptions, andas such they certainly point a moral.

MULTIPLE ABSCESS OF THE BRAIN : RECOVERYAFTER OPERATION.

Dr. John Guttmann reports the followinginteresting case in the Laryngoscope for May.The patient was a woman aged 33, who, after

perforation of the drum of the ear, developed, someweeks later, an acute mastoiditis. She complainedof very severe headache, nausea, sleeplessness,depression, and fever. The -mastoid operation wasperformed. In the antrum there was only a smallamount of pus, but a good deal of granulationtissue. For two days the general state improved,but on the third the temperature suddenly rose to102&deg; F., with much headache on the left side.There developed a slight drooping of the left uppereyelid, a slight ptosis, and slowness of cerebration.Nausea and general malaise were present. The eye-grounds were normal, as was also sensation totouch and pain. The labyrinth reaction was

normal, although the caloric test on the left ear

showed a somewhat sluggish reaction. The pulse-rate was only 66, and an amnesic aphasia developed,A second operation was performed, and the tem-poro-sphenoidal lobe was exposed after removalof the squama of the temporal bone. The brainwas explored in different directions. When the

director was inserted anteriorly and downwardsan ounce of thin non-fcetid pus was evacuated. No

lining membrane existed for this cavity. It was

packed with iodoform gauze and the patientreturned to bed. Some improvement followed,but the amnesic aphasia continued. Five days slater the patient became worse and the aphasiawas more marked. Again the brain was explored,and this time the director, when directed upwards

1 Dr. P. Fildes: THE LANCET, July 10th, 1915, p. 82.