natural processes, which again must be carried on. It is wrong to dispense large amounts of hormones as the effect is bad. Hormones are effective in smallest doses. While high dosage can have an erotic effect, the correct dosage increases vitality. The method of their working is not yet known. Inner secretion-vegetative-hormonal disturbances have a very good prognostication with hormonal treatment. It has no bad effect on an endocrine gland. Many hormone syndromes are closely interrelated always with the involvement of the autonomic nervous system and accompanied by the action of the mid-brain which itself is under hormonal influences.

The task of sexual hormones is not only the directing of the generative function and the stamping of secondary sex characteristics upon the personality, but also to exert an influence on the whole mental conduct owing to the unity of body and soul. The author warns against an undifferentiated application of sexual hormones without sufficient analysis and diagnosis, that is, without clarifying whether the morbid symptoms arise from an excess or a deficiency of hormones and which hormones are in question. Universal directions for the prescription of sex hormones cannot be given as each patient must be dealt with as a special case which requires individual treat-

ment.

The above paragraphs are in comment upon Dr. Cernea's book and made by Dr. Sigg, Director of the Polyclinic for Venereal Diseases of the Women's Hospital, Basle.

Seldom has an author presented so clear a picture of a neurotic as Cernea. That the author can penetrate so deeply into the need of a patient is demonstrated also by his description of "congelation urticaria" which is downright brilliant. The overall presentation in the field of sexuality is so excellent that one wishes with deepest convic-

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tion that every physician become familiar with it.

Dr. G. Hesse, Neurologist, Berlin. (Translation by T. M. Merritt.) PRIMATE BEHAVIOR: FIELD STUDIES OF MONKEYS AND APES, edited by Irven DeVore (of Harvard); Holt, Rinehart and Winston, New York, 1965, 654 pages, illustrated, $10.

Before the world got this mine of science the place thereof was only an ant hill. The mine comes of many hardy workers' watching wild animals in their native homes and natural conditions: the ant hill had been fabricated out of observations of captives in cages.

You may be shocked to learn how ignorant you are on this important subject-our distant cousins. Console yourself by reflecting that the rest of the world shares your shortcomings.

By the time we were graduated from college we had been exposed to much learning, including geography, biology, comparative anatomy and sociology. Some of that learning rubbed off upon us; but since then much of it has rubbed off-off. Now these two dozen scientists have ganged up on us to show us how little of that which we learned has stuck with us.

Written in language that is formidably scientifical, Primate Behavior is toilsome reading for the generality of us. But stepping the scientific shorthand down into the vernacular would require more wordage; and the volume is of two or three pounds' weight now. Homosexuality among primates is reported en passant; and the animals are as casual about their engaging in

it.

Mainmostly the account is pedestrian, facts are set down as noted and some of the questions that might occur to a reader are left unanswered. The book doesn't prove any point, is not intended to. What does observation of