Science is a wonderful thing. The world and its inhabitants seem to get along nicely observing every day functions and procedures which are accepted as just ordinary manifestations arousing little interest or believed to incapable of any expansion or analysis unti! the scientists get to work and then te whole pattern of existence suddenly changes, although centuries of research have not found a good cure for a cold or for baldness. A case in point has just occurred in England. Two members of the National Institute of Industrial Psychology have conducted exhaustive tests among elementary school children and it has been found that those whose breakfasts fall short of the best standards of contemporary dietetics "not only are dullards but have cold and clam: This specific conclusion sounds slightly strange, although it is within general knowledge that people who are underfed do not work or develop so much as people who are amply fed. Fifty children were selected for the test, the average age being about 6% years. Half got a breakfast fruit juice, porridge and milk, fish, or eggs, with brown bread and butter. The remainder had their usual breakfast at home which consisted of tea, bread, butter and jam. Surprising statistical results were discovered by the two psychologists. The balanced breakfasts first mentioned produced an increase of 7 per cent. progress in arithmetic, 11 per cent. in English and 11% per cent. in poetry—so the two investigators claim. It would be heresy to challenge the accuracy of these results beyond acceptance of the fact that it is better to work on a full stomach than an empty one, but the sceptical layman, deferring to the academic qualifications of the two investigators, might draw attention to the traditional history of English poets and writers who starved in Grubb Street garrets but enriched English literature by their efforts notwithstanding. Nobody wants a return to an underfed populace, but there does seem some inconsistency in the application of statistics to such a subject. One might say that Shakespeare's poaching raids for venison influenced his views on drama, or Johnson's pieces written for cooks as advertising may have assisted in the development of his genius. What woud happen with a champagne and caviar diet? It is a fertile subject for discussion. % ENA OAR
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.