years, and got well during a course of treatment by iodine which had been persistently tried at an earlier stage and given up as hopeless, and at last had been resumed in despair of any new thing to try.

Of course, if every child with ringworm were to lose on average nine months of its school life it would be a very serious matter, and one which justified even costly and somewhat dangerous methods of treatment; but in Staffordshire we have boldly taken the risks, and, basing our action on a belief in the low infectivity and the slight proneness to become epidemic which apparently characterize ringworm, we allow our children suffering from this complaint to remain in school if certain simple precautions are taken. We have practised this now for several years, and there has certainly been no tendency to increase in the number of cases in our schools.

County Education Offices,

Stafford.

THE FEEDING OF CHILDREN IN WAR TIME.1

By HARRY CAMPBELL, M.D., F.R.C.P.

Physician to the West End Hospital for Nervous Diseases; Author of "The Causation of Disease," "Respiratory Exercises in the Treatment of Disease."

At this time of food shortage a good deal is being said about the provision of suitable food for children. I see no reason why children should suffer from unsuitable or insufficient food. Abundant plain, wholesome food is available for them. Many children, especially among the well-to-do, have far too many delicacies in time of peace: there is too much tempting of the appetite with dainties-jellies, custards, blancmanges, rich pastry, and the like.

War bread is admirably suited to the healthy child after sufficient teeth have been cut to masticate it. War bread has been proved to be as nutritious and digestible as any other kind of bread, provided it is well masticated; and by mastication I mean a lateral, grinding movement, not a mere up and down, biting movement. Crusty war bread with plenty of butter, margarine, bacon fat, or dripping does better for children than any pudding I know of. It has much the same nutrient value as an ordinary suet pudding. Not only does it supply an abundance of fat and carbohydrates, but a good proportion of tissuebuilding proteids; while it has the advantage over pudding in that it promotes adequate mastication, and thus favours starch digestion, as well as the development of the nasal passages, teeth, jaws, and salivary glands.

I am never tired of insisting that starchy food should be given as much as possible in a form which compels adequate mastication. Porridge is, however, so valuable a food that it may be allowed, but thorough mastication should be insisted on. Unfortunately it is not very palatable without milk, and this just now is none too plentiful.

So far as weaned children are concerned, the dearth of milk is not so serious as some would have us believe. We hear a great deal about the disastrous consequences of depriving the children of their customary supply of milk. Only to-day I heard a lady complain that her house

1 Dr. Harry Campbell's suggestive paper will be labelled "heterodox" by many, but it is deserving of the fullest consideration. War conditions offer an opportunity for putting Dr. Campbell's views to scientifically conducted experimentation.-EDITOR, THE CHILD.

hold of four had been reduced to a daily allowance of a pint and a half, for," she said, "my boy (aged 3 years) alone requires that amount.” In point of fact, the said boy required no milk whatever. Milk may be a good enough food for him in limited quantities, but it is not a requisite, and it is indeed quite possible the boy would be better without any milk whatever. I have already expressed my opinion in this Journal regarding the strange fallacy, begotten of custom, that the human mammal requires the milk of another mammalian species after the period of weaning. He does not, and it shows the veriest obstinacy to contend that he does. Tens of thousands of lusty British children have been reared on a diet from which milk in any shape or form has been practically absent after the weaning time; while, on the other hand, hecatombs have been sent to their graves from drinking tuberculous milk. A further indictment against milk as a food for children is that in the form of milk puddings it has favoured the consumption of soft, pappy foods on which British children are far too exclusively fed.

Another equally unfounded belief is that sugar (ingested in the concentrated form) is a necessary food. There is no kind of foundation for it. The only sugar at the disposal of primitive man is the precarious supply of wild honey. Moreover, all the starch we consume enters the blood as sugar, and inasmuch as the British child is generally given an excess of starchy food his blood is, if anything, supplied with an excess of sugar, quite apart from the sugar which is ingested as such. This, though it may sound heretical, is the plain truth. I do not say that sugar derived from the sugar-cane and beet is a bad food. It adds to the pleasure of life, it has a pleasant taste, it is appetizing, and it is readily absorbed; with certain reservations it is permissible for children. What I say is that it is not an essential for children now any more than it was in the spacious times of Elizabeth. I do not want to be too hard on sugar, but I have no doubt that the British child has got more harm than good from it; for unless certain precautions are taken-and they practically never are-sugar is very apt to cause decay of the teeth.

Happily, owing to the development of allotments, this country is not likely to go short of vegetables. All fresh vegetables are good for children, and they have this advantage: that the child is not likely to eat too much of them. Care should be exercised as regards the pulses, e.g., lentils, which may disagree with some children if given too plentifully.

All plain animal food-fish, bird, meat, bacon, ham-is good for children from a tender age upwards. Let there be no mistake, man is a carnivorous animal, and indeed (as I have sought to show in another place) he owes his evolution from a lower animal type to his carnivorism.

One word in conclusion as to the amount of food required by children. I am persuaded that the children of the well-to-do, owing to the appetizing nature of their food, often consume far more food than they need and is good for them. This is not likely to happen if the food is plain. Let us remember that the injunction not to eat in excess during this war time applies to the child as well as to the grown-up. By all means let the child have enough, but don't let him have more than enough.

33, Cavendish Square,

W.1.

ABSTRACTS AND EXTRACTS.

Under this heading are gathered thoughts from literature, both ancient and modern, which seek to provide information likely to be of assistance to students of child life and practical workers for child welfare. It is hoped that our readers will co-operate in making this section both suggestive and serviceable.