IN RELATION TO THE WAR. 481 



Elmer Berry, of the International Y. M. C. A. College at Spring- 

 field, Massachusetts, both unusually interested in metabolism prob- 

 lems, arrangements were made to select twelve men out of a group 

 of volunteers from the student body. The men entered heartily 

 into the spirit of the whole research and readily consented to all the 

 strict requirements of the test. It is a great pleasure to record that 

 during the four months of experimenting there was not the slightest 

 indication of any of these men wittingly or unwittingly violating 

 even the strictest regulations of the research. The honor system 

 obtains at the College ; the men realized that they were in a position 

 to do the nation a great service and with the fidelity, enthusiasm, 

 and high ethical spirit exhibited by the whole student body, these 

 men went through the arduous four months without a serious com- 

 plaint. 



The general plan was to curtail the diet sufficiently to reduce 

 the weight approximately lO per cent. This could havie been done 

 by a complete withdrawal of food for about 14 or 15 days. It was 

 recognized that these men were, first, college students with obliga- 

 tions for educational advancement and, second, volunteers for scien- 

 tific research. A complete fast for 14 days would, in all probabil- 

 ity, have caused most of them considerable discomfort, if not distress. 

 The alternative was to curtail the dietetic intake so that the weight 

 loss would take place, not in 14 days, but in 4 to 6 weeks. This was 

 done by serving the men approximately one half to two thirds of the 

 caloric requirements prior to the dietetic control, making absolutely 

 no change in the kinds of foods eaten. The men were cautioned 

 not to lessen their mental or physical activities. Obviously if the 

 activity of a group of men were lessened as, for instance, by putting 

 them to bed, to use an extreme illustration, their dietetic requirements 

 would be very much less. Suffice it to say that these men carried 

 out all the requirements of collegiate activity, both physical and in- 

 tellectual, throughout the entire period. As soon as the reduction 

 in weight had reached 10 per cent, or thereabouts, the calories in the 

 intake were increased to such an extent as to hold the weight at a 

 constant level. The number of calories required to hold this weight 

 constant over a considerable period of time could be taken as a fair 

 representation of the actual caloric requirement for this group of 

 men. 



