A noted physician, who has successfully reduced many stout patients, lately made the statement that many fat people were willing to take any sort of treatment that was ordered for them, if only their diet was not restricted. It is upon restriction of diet, however, that the chief dependence must be placed, in the reduction of weight; exercise produces a more rapid burning up of fat in the body, but superfluous fat cannot be stored up, if the material for it is not supplied to the system. Many famous systems of reduction by restricted diet have been given to the world, but most of them are so severe that they should only be used under the direction of a physician. All of these systems require a reduction of the total amount of food taken, a restriction of the quantity of fluid allowed, and a more or less strict avoidance of those food substances which are most readily turned into fat in the body. Most of them also provide for light lunches in the middle of the morning and afternoon, as these additional meals tend to lessen the appetite at the heavier meals of the day. The fat-making foods include sugars, starches, fat meats, butter and oil. It is not safe to deprive the body entirely of these groups of food substances, since proper nutrition depends upon a wholesomely balanced diet, but the amount of them taken by the average person can be very greatly cut down without any danger to health. It is not unusual for a single meal to include a cream soup, bread and butter, potatoes, macaroni, a starchy vegetable, such as beans, a salad dressed with oil, and a rice or cornstarch pudding,--a list of articles which, as may readily be seen, contains a much larger amount of fat-making food than is required by the actual needs of the body.