; but nothing for the present was
actually done. However, I agreed to furnish Dr. North with a statement
of my own experience, and such other important facts as came within the
range of my own observations; and a statement of my experience was
subsequently intrusted to his care, as will be seen in its place, in the
body of this work.

In February, 1835, Dr. North, in the prosecution of his efforts,
addressed the following circular, or LETTER and QUESTIONS, to the editor
of the Boston Medical and Surgical Journal, which were accordingly
inserted in a subsequent number of that work. They were also published
in the American Journal of Medical Science, of Philadelphia, and copied
into numerous papers, so that they were pretty generally circulated
throughout our country.

"To the Editor of the Boston Medical and Surgical Journal.

"SIR,--Reports not unfrequently reach us of certain individuals who have
fallen victims to a prescribed course of regimen. Those persons are
said, by gentlemen who are entitled to the fullest confidence, to have
pertinaciously followed the course, till they reached a point of
reduction from which there was no recovery. If these are facts, they
ought to be collected and published. And I beg leave, through your
Journal, to request my medical brethren, if they have been called to
advise in such cases, that they will have the kindness to answer,
briefly, the following interrogatories, by mail, as early as convenient.

"Should the substance of their replies ever be embodied in a small
volume, they will not only receive a copy and the thanks of the author,
but will have the pleasure to know they are assisting in the settlement
of a question of great interest to the country. If it should appear
probable that their patient was laboring under a decline at the
commencement of the change of diet, this ought, in candor, to be fully
disclosed.

"It will be perceived, by the tenor of the questions, that they are
designed to embrace not only unfortunate results of a change of diet,
but such as are favorable. There are, in our community, considerable
numbers who have entirely excluded animal food from their diet. It is
exceedingly desirable that the results of such experiments, so difficult
to be found in this land of plenty, should be ascertained and thrown
before the profession and the community. Will physicians, then, have the
kindness, if they know of any persons in their vicinity who have
excluded ani