VITAMINES 43 



may be obtained by adding vitamines thus extracted from 

 nutritious proteins to the ordinary milk or cereal of infants 

 suffering from malnutrition and cessation of growth (Eddy). 



From this brief survey of a vast field of biology into which 

 we are led by the activities of the simple organism Yeast, we 

 learn that vital activities of animals and plants consist of a series 

 of intricate reactions through the agency of enzymes and other 

 subtle chemical bodies. Partly by experiment in the hands 

 of eminent physiologists like Hoppe-Seyler, Ostwald, Hof- 

 meister, Mathews and others, and partly by theory, we are 

 brought to the present-day conclusion that not only cleavage 

 processes which occur during the preparation for assimilation 

 of foods, not only all of the processes of destructive metabolism 

 with the consequent liberation of energy in the form of light, heat, 

 electricity, or movement, but also all of the synthetic processes 

 in protein formation, from the union of the simplest beginning 

 materials like carbonic acid, water, and nitrogen-holding salts 

 to the most complicated albumen compounds, are, one and all, 

 effects of specific chemical bodies, each of which plays its part. 



