i''-o] Foods — human NUTRiTioisf. 459 



(;orinan nutrition, 1{)14-1J>1», C. C. Mason (liitl. Johns Hopkins Hosp., 

 SI (V.Kid), So. .I'i'.K pp. ISG-IH, lifix. 7).— This is a discussion of the policies 

 ad()pt«'(l hy Cermaiiy in i-ff^^ird to tlii' food sitiiatioii durinj? the war and the 

 lessiins tliat siiould he drawn from the failure of the German system of ration- 

 in^'. Attention is called lo I he essential differences between food control as 

 practiced by Enj;huid and the food rationing of Germany. 



"Food control can he a success, mass rationing;- will always l)e a failure. 

 I'.y food control, as the term is now used, is meant a control of those activities 

 which tend to dissipate t^lie energy contained in food and a more complete 

 conservation of the same. liroadly sjieaking, any activity which tends to raise 

 the price of any article of food above its normal level tends to destroy the 

 usefulness of the food and in that way works iigainst the greatest public good. 

 Under this type of activity we can class such things as useless transportation, 

 too many middlemen, or withholding food from the market in order to maintain a 

 price. Inasmuch as such procedures tend to keep the food out of the hands of 

 the consumer they work against fullest conservation of national resources. 

 Along the lines of positive control there is a great deal of work to be done 

 tin the stock question, the relationship whicli must exist between the number 

 of people and the amount of live stock to be maintained. This problem alone 

 played a quite important part in the German food (piestion all during the war. 

 Tlien the control of live stock is intimately wrapped up witli the question 

 of the milling of flours, the choice of grains to be nulled, the percentage to 

 which they shall be made of the millings." 



From the experiences of England and Germany in' relation to the problem 

 of mass feeding under conditions of famine, blockade, or siege, the author 

 draws the following conclusions: 



" Food- control, i. e., food conservation, must b(> practiced by every person. 



"Live stock nmst be reduced to a level comjiatible with the grain supply. 



" The people nuist .subsist on a larger percentage of vegetable products, in- 

 creasing the amount of land u.sed for such crops as rapidly as such land is 

 freed from the support of live stock. Bread will form the staple of diet, so 

 the milling of the flour must be carried out in the most efficient manner, taking 

 into consideration the actual nutriment to be given to humans and to stock. 



"Rationing must be limited to those articles which are luxuries; necessities, 

 1. e., bread, meat, potatoes, etc., must be permitted to circulate freely. (In 

 case of actual siege or practically closed blockade it may become necessary to 

 eidorce stringent rationing.) The psychological aspects must never be over- 

 looked." 



Tables and charts of statistical data illustrative of food conditions in Ger- 

 many during the war are included. 



The chemical isolation of vitamins, C. N. Myers and C. Voegtlin {Jour. 

 Biol. Chcm., J,2 {1920), No. 1, pp. 199-205).— The authors describe the prepara- 

 tion of active antineuritic material from autolyzed and from dried brewers' 

 yeast. 



The techni(iue of the preparation of the extract from autolyzed yeast is as 

 follows: Bottom yeast, obtained fresh from the brewery, was pressed into a 

 cake and then placed in a hot room (40° C.) in alcohol barrels with 200 cc. of 

 chloroform for 100 lbs. of yeast. In about 36 hours autolysis was complete, 

 and the liquid was run through a filter press. The filtrate was then treated 

 with concentrated HCI in the proi)ortion of 40 cc. of acid to 1 liter of filtrate. 

 The precipitate thus formed was filtered off, and the clear filtrate shaken 

 with one-fourth its volume of olive oil until an emulsion was formed. After 

 standing until two distinct layers were formed the oil layer was separated, 

 filtered to remove sediment, taken up with from 8 to 10 volumes of ether, 



