latter has none of the curiosity, the seeking for experience, the
active interest, the pliant expanding will, the sweet capacity
for affection, friendship and love present in the average child.
The cretin is a travesty on the human being in body, mind and
character.

But feed him thyroid gland. Mind you, the dried substance of the
glands, not of human beings, but of mere sheep. The cretin begins
to grow mentally and physically and loses to a large extent the
grotesqueness of his appearance. He grows taller; his tongue no
longer lolls in his mouth; the hair becomes finer, the hands less
coarse, and the patient exhibits more normal human emotions,
purposes, intelligence. True, he does not reach normality, but
that is because other defects beside the thyroid defect exist and
are not altered by the thyroid feeding.

There is a much more spectacular disease to be cited, --a
relatively infrequent but well-understood condition called
myxoedema, which occurs mainly in women and is also due to a
deficiency in the thyroid secretion. As a result the patient, who
may have been a bright, capable, energetic person, full of the
eager purposes and emotions of life, gradually becomes dull,
stupid, apathetic, without fear, anger, love, joy or sorrow, and
without purpose or striving. In addition the body changes, the
hair becomes coarse and scanty, the skin thick and swollen (hence
the name of the disease) and various changes take place in the
sweat secretion, the heart action, etc.

Then, having made the diagnosis, work the great miracle! Obtain
the dried thyroid glands of the sheep, prepared by the great drug