The complete analysis of hunger may not yield us control over the hunger mechanism, but it is at least the most promising line of attack. The scientist will concede its value to biology, and the physician readily appreciates its significance for rational therapeutics; but the layman may question the practical utility of hunger control to society as a whole, in view of the fact that it has played no rdle in past evolution. This is granted. But the elimination of many biological correctives by the artificialities of modern civilization calls for rational guidance of all phases of human behavior, including the desire for food. In these times of plenty, overfeeding, with its physiological penalties and economic waste, is on the whole more prevalent than undernutrition, because of the barbaric indulgeuce in the pleasures of the table in the absence of the physical stress of more primitive social condition. And when hunger becomes pathologically exaggerated the physician of today knows no remedy; when it fails in disease, he dispenses the "bitter herb" of tradition-and hopes for the best. Hence, when the reader has followed us through these we hope not too technical pages, we believe that he will agree that there is yet much work to be done on the problem of hunger control-work worth doing, co-operative work of the clinic and the biological laboratory.

A. J. Carlson

University of Chicago September, 1916