ALCOHOL, DISEASE, AND HEREDITARY DEFECTS 285 



conditions realized to any considerable degree. However, there 

 has been found little correlation between the amount of drunken- 

 ness in any city or country and the number of defective people. 

 Dr. Bevan Lewis and Dr. Sullivan have shown that in England 

 the inland or agricultural communities had the least amount of 

 drunkenness and a high ratio of pauperism and insanity, while 

 mining and manufacturing communities which were the most 

 intemperate had a very small ratio of pauperism and insanity. 

 This fact, while contrary to what one might expect in the light of 

 the fact previously cited, may not be indicative of anything in 

 regard to the hereditary effects of alcohol. The better endowed 

 may have migrated into the cities, leaving the poorer stock to 

 perpetuate the race in the country, and there may have been 

 various other social forces that would work in the same direction. 

 The situation illustrates how dangerous it is to take statistics at 

 their face value, and to base conclusions on them without a 

 knowledge of the various possible factors which may account for 

 the results. 



One of the most systematic investigations of the subject that 

 has appeared in recent years is the Study of the Influence of 

 Parental Alcoholism on the Physique and Ability of the Offspring 

 written by Elderton and Pearson, and published by the Eugenics 

 Laboratory of London. The material investigated consisted of a 

 school in Edinburgh and some special schools in Manchester. 

 The parents of the school children were carefully studied and their 

 habits as regards alcohol accurately ascertained. In the data 

 from the Manchester schools the parents were classed as either 

 temperate or intemperate, but a closer grading was made of the 

 Edinburgh parents who were grouped into teetotalers, sober, 

 suspected to drink, drinks, has bouts of drinking. The children 

 were graded as to height, weight, health, eye-sight and mental 

 ability. Then a comparison was made between these character- 

 istics and the habits of the parents. It was found (i) that in both 

 Edinburgh and Manchester there was a higher death rate among 

 the children of the alcoholic parents, and that the alcoholic 

 parents had more children, so that the net family was about the 



