Iron is only of value in certain forms of anaemia, and the many patent medicines purporting to contain haemoglobin or organic iron are therefore useless to neuropaths. The Roman plan of drinking water in which swords had been rusted, is quite as valuable as drinking expensive proprietary compounds. When iron is indicated Blaud's Pills are perhaps the best preparation. Huge quantities of patent medicines containing phosphates in the form of hypo-or glycerophosphates, and (or) lecithin are sold annually. All phosphorus compounds are reduced to inorganic phosphates in the digestive tract, absorbed and eliminated, so that, as with iron, if phosphates are needed, the form in which they are taken is of no moment. Why, then, pay huge sums for organic-phosphorus compounds (synthesized from inorganic phosphates) when they are immediately reduced to the same constituents from which they were constructed, the only value in the reduction process being seen in the immense fortunes which patent-medicine proprietors accumulate? Lecithin is isolated from animal brain, or egg-yolk, and commercial lecithin is impure. Not only does the ordinary daily diet contain ample lecithin (5 grammes), but two eggs will double this, while liver or sweetbread, both rich in phosphorous, may be eaten. The much-vaunted glycerophosphates are decomposed to and excreted as phosphates. Sollmann's remarks apply to all similar proprietary articles: "A proprietary compound of glycerophosphates and casein has been widely and extravagantly advertised as 'Sanatogen'. It is a very costly food, and in no sense superior to ordinary casein, such as cottage cheese." Hypophosphites have been boomed by various people, chiefly for financial reasons. Five or six of them are usually prescribed, with the addition of cod liver oil, and perhaps quinine, and (or) iron and strychnine, the complexity of the prescription being expected, apparently, to compensate for the uselessness of its various ingredients. To deduce rational remedies, it is first necessary to elucidate the causes of inefficiency; and to expect a brain which is out of order to function in an orderly manner simply because it is supplied with one of the substances necessary to its normal functioning (regardless of whether a deficiency of that substance is the cause of the disorder), is as rational as it would be to expect to restart an automobile engine, the magneto of which was broken, by filling up the half-empty petrol tank. * * * * * CHAPTER XXI TRAINING THE NERVOUS CHILD "When shall I begin to train my child?" said a young mother to an old doctor. "How old is the child, madam?" "Two years, sir!" "Then, madam, you have lost just two years," answered the old physician, gravely.