DISTURBANCES OF GROWTH 245 



other way by saying that there are but three types of diets which suc- 

 ceed in the nutrition of man or animals. One of these is the strictly 

 carnivorous diet such as certain of the Eskimos, the American Indians, 

 the natives of Iceland until a generation ago, Laplanders, Patagonians 

 and others subsisted or still subsist on. Judged by their physical develop- 

 ment these peoples are about as successful in their nutrition as are the 

 carnivorous animals such as the lion, tiger, wolf and others. Success 

 with this type of diet depends upon the consumption of a sufficient 

 amount of the glandular organs, bone marrow, bony tissue, blood, etc., as 

 well as of muscle and fat. Confinement for a few weeks to a diet of 

 muscle tissue (steak, ham, chops, etc.) alone", which represents the type 

 of meat eating which appeals to the people of America at present, will 

 do great harm. 



The second type of diet which succeeds is that consisting of cereal 

 grains, legume seeds, tubers and meats, supplemented with liberal amounts 

 of leafy vegetables. The vegetative parts of plants, the leaves and grow- 

 ing tips of stems, contain everything that is essential for the nutrition of 

 an animal. Many species and herbivorous animals subsist throughout the 

 normal span of life on grass or other leaves, with -or without -seed grains. 

 They cannot long survive on a diet restricted 'to the storage tissues of 

 plants, such as seeds, tubers and fleshy roots. The leaf, or vegetative part 

 of the plant has decidedly different dietary properties from the repro- 

 ductive parts, containing as they do much reserve food material. 



The third type of diet which is satisfactory for the maintenance of 

 normal growth and well-being is that in which seeds, tubers and meats are 

 supplemented with liberal amounts of milk. Provided a sufficient portion 

 of the food mixture, a fraction which has as yet not been satisfactorily 

 determined, consists of milk, the selection of the other components and 

 their relative amounts are without -much significance, since the dietary 

 properties of cereals, legume seeds, tubers and muscle tissue meats are 

 similar. 



The widespread practice hag grown up of marketing for human con- 

 sumption the degerminated and decorticated cereal products such as 

 bolted wheat flour, polished rice and degerminated corn meal, instead of 

 the whole kernel ground to a flour or meal, as was formerly the case. 

 This practice resulted from the necessity of increasing the keeping qual- 

 ities of bread grain products owing to the long period required for trans- 

 portation and marketing at the present time. The substitution of these 

 milled products for the entire grains is unfortunate, because the dietary 

 defects of the seeds from which they were prepared are markedly accentu- 

 ated. Modern marketing on the scale made necessary by the growth of 

 the urban population requires that such products be manufactured and 

 that they continue to enter into the 'human diet in considerable amounts. 

 This makes it more urgent now than formerly, that the other articles in 



