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NewThi q&s'Noi Found in Any Bodcr Why There Were More NEUROTICS 300 Years Ago Than NOW N EUROSIS has been regarded as a modern affliction- And for this reason it has been held that the "neurotics” were people of wealth suffering from a strictly up-to-the-minute malady, caused for the most part by high living and lack of affairs to keep them in terested In life. But Pierre Janet, the famous French neurologist, de clares neurosis is far from being a modern affliction. Quite the reverse, according to this eminent scientist. In explaining that neurosis Is in reality nothing more or less than "that tired feeling," or a certain sort of tired feeling. Professor Janet states that the nervousness and hysteria of today are but child's play compared with the hysteria that prevailed two, three and four hundred years ago. Detecting Artificial FLAVORING FORMERLY all fruit extracts and flavors were obtained from vegetable sources, but at present many are made in the chemical laboratory by synthetic methods, that is, putting various elements together, and while the flavors are duplicated, traces of the acids, alkalies and other compounds used in bringing about the necessary com binations are often present. These are de cidedly injurious to the human system. Many extracts which cannot be made from the fresh fruits are manufactured by the synthetic method. The list includes straw berry, pineapple, raspberry, peach banana and pistachio—all danger marks to be avoided. Legally, all flavoring extracts are strong solutions of the essential oils or flavoring qualities of the fruit, put up in alcohol. Be cause of this, the strength of orange or lemon extract may be examined by a simple dilution of water To do this, fill a tall tumbler nearly full of cold water and add a teaspoonful of the extract. The nil will be thrown out of solution and a decidedly milky cloud will appear near the surface of the water. The depth of the color enables one to roughly determine the strength of the ex tract. Absence of the color is proof positive that the sample is artificial or very weak Pure lemon or orange extract is almost color- Why You Should Rub MOSQUITO BITES THERE are three factors in a female mosquito s bite (the. male does not attack us at all). These are first, the tiny wound in the skin made by the puncturing weapon in the trunk of the insect; secondly, a certain amount of poison which accompanies the stab, and, thirdly, the withdrawal of the blood of the sleeping —or often the waking—person. The amount of blood withdrawn is very slight, not. enough to matter, unless there be a number of bites and the sufferer be ' anemic. The wound itself is of small importance, since it is finer than the finest needle-prick. The small amount of poison is the really disturbing factor. A poi sonless mosquito would be a great improvement on the . present kind After a bite there is set up in the skin a surface. Irritation. In some people, when the blood is in poor condition, the wound in the capillary, or tiny blood-, vessel, no larger than a hair, which appears under the ; skin is not resistant to the poison, and quite a large , lump appears. The lump consists of particles produced ; by the blood of a kind o( ce " the blood whlch 18 hoS ' tile to tbe poison, and these bank up like a barricade to prevent any further entrance into the fortress of the body. As soon as the effect of the poison is worked off these defensive cells disappear, and everything is all light again Scratching or rubbing with the flat of finger has the effect of quickening the action <4f the blood-vessels in the region of the bite to bring their defensive cells faster, and by that means it helps to keep out the poison. But great care must be taken not to scratch with the finger nail the inflamed region round about the bite, for the reason that it is more tender than at other times and the skin might be scratched so that blood would flow This might help in spreading the mosquito poison, or more likely still, would set up further trouble by pos sible infection from the dirt under the finger-nail, which collects there w ithin a few minutes after the most care ful manicuring and which is filled with germs. The best thing to do for mosquito bites is to rub them with an alkali, such as ammonia, or common soda, since the poi>on of the mosquito is acid, and the alkali will neutralize its effects. In the event of not having any alkali available, it Is helpful to moisten the finger with the tongue and then rub hard over the inflamed pace, as the acid secreted in the inner portion of the mouth, tor aid in eating, also has a neutralizing effei t. though, of course, an effect less strong than an alkaline substance Many times a mosquito bite becomes worse after scratching it. This is because whatever advantage <fi» re was in rubbing the tiny wound was counteracted by 'he poisonous nail.- which added to the poison of tbe wound. Many times serious sores result from this But a mild rubbing with the finger, not the nail, will prove beneficial. NEUROSIS, According to a French Professor, Is Merely “THAT TIRED FEELING” "There are," says Professor Janet, “three volumes by Pomme. a great medical authority of the eighteenth cen tury, dealing with‘Vapeurs’or nervous diseases. These chow that we of to-day are scarcely nt all afflicted with hysteria and other forms of neurosis compared with the manner in which the people were afflicted along in liOO, 1600 and even in 1700. "It sometimes affected villages, towns, cities and whole nations. Hundreds, thousands, tens of. thousands thought themselves ’possessed.’ Hordes of persons af flicted with epilepsy and St. Vitus’ dance roamed the highways. People called ‘fanatics,’ but in reality being no more than neurotics, raced up and down the country, slashing each other with whips and acting in otherwise crazy manners. "There were the witch hangings in Salem, Mass., the witch hangings and burnings elsewhere; these so-called witches were merely neurotics, aud those who executed them were equally neurotic. "There were infinitely more nervous diseases in olden times than there are to-day, and they were more dan gerous, because affecting not au individual or individu als, but the masses. “We live in a peaceful age. the period of political and religious persecution is happily past. Present day eco nomic conditions prevent the possibility of widespread famine or of epidemics that cannot be arrested. Every one of the calamities enumerated caused individual neu rosis in past times and, iu addition, neurosis of the masses. “Neurosis Is nothing worse than that tired feeling,’ and, ail reports and public Imagination to the contrary less, and If it shows a decided yellow color, the presence of coal tar dye may be sus pected. Caramel is a common adulterant of vanilla. To determine its presence, shake the vanilla bottle and observe the bubbles. If caramel ia present, a distinct brown color may be seen; if no color is observed, the ex tract is free from it, as the foam of pure ex tract is colorless. To test for strength, put a ’ablesnoonful of the extract in a white cup. set the cup in a saucepan of hot water, and evaporate the extract to one-third of the original amount. The residue will settle to the bottom of the dish as a brownish precipitate, while arti ficial extracts will remain clear under the same conditions. It is well to avoid all bright colored ex tracts. Lemon of a vivid chrome yeilow in color, or orange that is as golden in color as a ripe orange, are generally flavoring extracts that have been colored by means of aniline dyes And so it is with a great many other extracts. It never is wise to pur chase cheap flavoring extracts, as a mo ment’s thought will convince anyone that they are costly to make and consequently the honestly made extracts cannot be sold cheaply. THE migration of birds, whereby even weak-winged species will >■ y thou sands of miles from breeding to feed ing grounds, is one of the most fascinating of the unknown fields of science- Recently, however, those who have adopted the science of bird-lore, or ornithology, have determined that migrating birds fly at far greater heights than nad been imagined, and that the reason why migration has not been definitely mapped out is because it is invisible. Most of the recent observations have been made by special instruments, but until within a year or two accidental observations made of birds passing across the fields of astronomi cal telescopes afforded the only basis. Extraordinary as it may seem, there are scores of authenticated records showing birds flying at a height of two or three miles, and Why CROWDS and Mobs Do CRAZY THINGS ONE of the greatest difficulties that a Government has to face is the collective stupidity of large groups of people. Individuals as a rule pos sess a fairly high degree of intelligence, but crowds are uniformly lacking in reason and control. A nation will permit cheerfully evils that not a single person of that nation would allow for a moment if it were an individual matter. Politics is the most extraordi nary evidence of this. The childishness of modern society is the principal capital of the unscrupulous politician, for he knows that he can do for the public— or to the public—what he could never do to the indi viduals that compose it. For example, no single man would profess to believe in human equality and straightway proceed to develop enormous differences of social position, yet the nation has done this very thing. No man would declare him self opposed to all the pretensions of rank, yet defi nitely form a rank based upon wealth, but this has • been characteristic of the last few decades in the United States. No man would complain of the idle ness of his rich neighbor and yet tight tooth and nail to keep him from having any work to do, yet this is the necessary sequence of the curious governmental mixture of the present time. No man in his senses would try to stop beggary by making begging easy, yet in effect this Is the very attitude taken by the thousands of well-meaning but unthinking people. There is nothing so disconcerting to a politician or even a statesman as a single constituent, nothing so easy to deal with as a delegation or a committee. Tbe arguments of the stump speaker convince no reader, but do convince large meetings. Tbe impassioned oia tory of the 'special pleader’ would be in vain before a jury if he had to make the speech to each of the jurymen in turn. It is because they are twelve in Copyright. 1912. by America n-Exa miner Great Britain Rights YOU MIGHT TRY- An Envelope Funnel. A GOOD substitute for a small funnel used in Alling salt and pepper * * boxes may be made by cutting off a corner of an envelope and cut ting off the tip of the corner. A Bread Cereal. pOR a good breakfast dish, toast slices of bread, white or graham, * crumb fine and eat with cream and sugar the same as any of the prepared breakfast foods. Value of Lemon Juice. I ISE lemon juice whenever you can instead of vinegar and you will ' find it will greatly improve your health. Cleaning Cut Glass. TO cleanse and brighten cut glass, wash it in lukewarm water, to which has been added .a little blueing. Instead of a cloth use soft tissue paper and you will be greeted with a brilliant polish. Two Crops of Lilacs. YOU can get two crops of lilac blooms from your bushes if. after the first lot of blooms are beginning to fade, you will strip the bushes of both the leaves and withered blooms. Padding Stair Carpet. A PAD of very thick paper laid over the edge of each step under the carpet will prevent it from wearing, and double the lease of its life. Why So FEW BIRDS Are SEEN records of five miles (secured by comparing the approximate size of the bird with lunar features of known dimensions) have been noted. Birds are able to breathe air far more rare<fied than earth-dwelling animals, but it is practically a new idea that such great heights are reached. It has been suggested that minor physiological changes permit birds to make full use of this rarefied air, but this view is not widely accepted At. these great heights the speed of flight appears to be greater than in the denser air near the ground. The American golden plover seems to hold the record for long distance flights, and in this flight a speed of from 150 to 200 miles an hour is maintained. The plover leaves Nova Scotia for South America and scorns to make use of the coast line at all. In the event of adverse winds gr ; jEI obi The So-Called “Witches” Hanged in the Olden Days Were Neurotics, •nd So Were Those Who Hanged Them. i i ' F*W4 Jr ' : ■Jb.r ■- >4 v- <43 ■ 4 > i ■ /Ta ■ * ' .BB “An orator talking to one man can not interest him, but the same speech delivered to a crowd will make them all enthusiastic.” notwithstanding. It is decreasing Instead of increasing. Few people have a correct idea of neurosis; a good many deny its very existence, assuming that it exists only in the imagination of the sufferer. Neurosis has been called excitement of the limbs, or the mentality, but it means infinitely more. "Why the fixed idea, in some people’s heads, that they are obliged to get excited without cause? “Neurosis is exhaustion, rendering lame various func tions of the organism and reducing its capacity for work. The organism does some work well and some less well. Neurosis always interferes with the most delicate und least perfect work of the organism. “The most delicate work of the organism, If properly performed, allows the nerves to respond instantly to the demands of the moment, of whatever nature, either physical or mental. “Man, especially in the United States of America, lives in a perpetual turmoil. He is constantly asked to change, to meet the physical, mental, economic and moral demands made upon him. For these changes he must be ready at any moment, and, in addition to these per sonal changes, he must keep pace with the changes of the race, for the race as well as the individual is con stantly changing. "The person unable to keep up the pace, that is with the constant changing of self, is suffering from neurosis; he is unable to respond to the demands confronting him. He is exhausted, tired, weak. “In a great many cases neurosis is inherited. In other Instances it is due to a youth unhygienic, both physically and morally. Wrong methods of feeding, overfeeding and underfeeding, may bring on neurosis, so or exceedingly stormy weather, which cannot be dodged by ascending or descending to -other strata of the air, the plover may make a landing on some of the West India islands, and in rare cases on the Bermudas, but gen erally the 2,500 miles flight is accomplished direct, and always within one day and night. The Pacific golden plover likewise finds its way annually from Alaska to the Hawaiian islands, a matter of 2,400 miles, the trip again usually being made in a day. it is evi dent that to a land bird the flight would necessarily be continuous for the double reason that there is no landing and that there is no food. The high flight, moreover, gives a great sweep of vision and aids the homing instinct by keeping the birds from missing the land sought. The only reason we do not. see these tens of millions of birds overhead each Spring and Winter is because they flv too high. number that he is able to carry it through. The crowd is dominated by a primitive intuition not by reason. Tbe psychology of this seems to lie in the fact that individuals reason by processes peculiar to them selves rather than by any systematic plan, and in consequence they do not reason alike, and from the same premises do not reach the same conclusions. The simpler and more primitive the conclusion, the easier it is for all persons in a crowd to grasp the point. Not five per cent in any lynching mob would vote to lynch a victim, not a fifth of one per cent would hang or burn or shoot as an individual. By some un conscious process a crowd seems to realize that as a body it cannot reason subtly and it does not try. Ibis is also the failure of the most cleverly wrought plays; they are presented to masses, not to individuals. It is of interest to note how a dramatized novel (if successful) eliminates all the subtleties of the book from which it was taken. The book. "Oliver Twist,” is a study of character development; the play is a melodrama of incidents which are only illustrative in tbe book. For this no single person is to blame. A crowd of college professors is afflicted with this infection of stupidity just as much as a group of club-women or a hall of laborers. It is tbe fault of a definite mob psychology and this again follows the principle that where a large variety of numbers is to be treated the lowest common denominator is to be found. sue expression of a crowd is the lowest common denomi nator of all the Individuals composing it. Manufacturers have learned this, in away, through labor troubles and to-day the experienced manufacturer or his representative much rather have a large dele gation of laborinig men come to him with a complaint, that to have the laborers send only one or two men The clever manufacturer can generally make a much better impression upon a large delegation and con vince them that their demands are impossible to grant, at least for the present. The World’s GREATEST FRAUD IN spite of the fact that the calendars of the courts of justice are crowded, that prisons are full and that every tenth man you meet has “served time,” it is a difficult thing to defraud other people. The lives we live are so entangled with other lives that merely to realize how much we are de pendent on others and they on us is difficult. How much more difficult is it, then, not only to figure out all these relations, hut also to concoct a fraudulent scheme which shall also be in harmony with all these other lives at every point. But it is easy to da fraud ourselves. The man or woman wbo lives a "double life” rarely escapes discovery, though it vety often happens that the discoverer does not tell because no good would come of it. But the man or woman who is carrying on tbe deception is conscious of it and unless the condition is of very short duration the burden grows extremely heavy. He has de frauded himself of his peace of mind. Youth goes hand in hand with ambition and both are linked to conceit. The world, it is said, soon shakes the conceit cut of a may any -sort of exhaustion, he it from overwork or ex citement. Overwork or excitement, Is trying to fores boay or mind, or Both, to do things wuich either, or both of them cannot properly perform, because tile organ ism is constitutionally weak, or weakened by the ex igencies of lite. ”Oue may contract neurosis at any time of life, just so long as one stands In the midst of life and works hard, suffers, worries, allows cue’s self to get excited, etc. “And the more a person worries, exhausts himself, overworks himself to meet existing conditions, economic, social or otherwise, the more he is liable to contract neurosis, because the sort of life he leads exhausts his powers. "It is popularly believed that the present generation is more subject to neurosis than our forebears, but as a matter of fact, we know very little about the nervous diseases of our grandfathers and great grandfathers. It pleases some people to boast of their sufferings and have it understood that no one ever suffered before as they do, but medical literature of the past teaches us that our ancestors were quite as much subject to neurosis as we are, only the thing was known by another name, or by a variety of names. “It may sound paradoxical, but I am convinced that progress in civilization will eventually' minimize the number of persons suffering from neurosis. Whether neurosis will ever be eradicated is doubtful, for exhaus tion, that is, neurosis, is the tribute we pay to progress. A society or a race that doesn’t know neurosis at all would be pitiable, because its overwhelming majority stands still, rejects progress. Such a society or raes would be degenerating." man. Often it does, and instead of his owl plans and ideas he accepts the meaner stand ard set by the people around him. With the purpose gone, the belief in himself ' <tie» rapidly He has defrauded himself of his own powers. The border line between failure and suc cess is the will. As long as a man believes that he is stronger than the circumstances he has to meet, so long will he be stronger than they. As soon as he admits that they are stronger than he is that very instant is he defeated. There is no man living who is not stronger than any group of circumstance! that he may have to face, but there are many who are only too willing to cry out about the impossibility of fighting against fate or of doing anything with the luck against them and all such phrases. They have defrauded themselves of their will. ' orst of all, the psychology of this de ceiving of one’sself works like a narcotic; it stupefies and drugs the mind. The world s greatest fraud is that of defrauding our selves into the belief that we have not de frauded ourselves. s to Know About BAKING POWDER THERE are three great classes of baking powder on the market—phosphate, cream of tartar and alum. In each one soda is used as the alkali which combines the presence of moisture with the acid phosphate, cream of tartar or alum, and gives off carbonic acid gas—the same agent that is generated by the growth of the yeast plant in the leavening of bread. I'hese bubbles of gas, pushing to the surface, carry the dough with them, and then are driven off by heat until the loaf is dried out or "done.” The gas disappears—but what of the chemicals that generated it? ■The phosphate powder leaves a deposit of common salt. The tartar powder results in Rochelle salts powder leaves a residue of alUffllnum Common salt is not injurious to the body. Rochelle salts are simply iaxative, while aluminum sulpha e i eonst.pating and has a retarding effect upon the dr h e ° rgaDS- iU S ° ,De CaSeß CaUSiD « sev ere bowel dmturbances. ah of which shows that the Lum powd er ls the least adapted to health Jhe price of the phosphate and cream of ten powders is about the same; while the alum r ' sell for half the price, and consequently have a spread use d " Ifl * It is not generally known that the phosnhate s > . powder does the best work, that is. that ’ duce more gas to the spoonful than either of uL others, while it takes twice as much of the alum powder to bring about the same result. In This the cost is really the same. ? Packages containing baking powder are usualiv •stamped plainly with tbe list of ingredients. In ** alum ts not indicated, and its presence is suspected Professor Lewis B. Allyn, in “Kitchen Methods foL Chemical Tests,” gives the following test- "Flace tablespoonful of the sample in a clean white tea cun and add a teaspoonful of water. Add ten drnt U.e.ur. .nd lb , am X . » carbonate solution. If alum is nresent amontum „ ... Md In case it is advisable to make the bnkin<- J'' hOIUe ’ ‘ Ue f ° llowi ng proportions give good resLis' halt pound and one ounce cream of tartar quarter pound baking soda, quarter pound cornstarch These must be sifted together ten times through a fine sieve, and put up in small, tightly closed cans Homemade baking powder does not give as satisfaci tory results as the commercial powders, because they lose their strength quickly, and are liable to become lumpy. But where eeoonmy is a necessity it i 8 better to make it than to use an alum powder and under mine the family health.