6o2 



POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



as a cause at the beginning, there is no way of determining 

 how long it continued to act. Hence, from this point on, the ex- 

 periment becomes mainly a history of disease. Practically it is 

 an equation in which we do not know whether there are one or 

 two unknown quantities, hence absolutely unamenable to solution. 

 In Fig. 3 is graphically expressed the relations of growth for 

 the four kittens above described, and also for several other normal 

 kittens of about the same ages that I happened to have at the 

 time. It is seen that the alcoholic- diseased animals are dwarfed 

 in growth to sixty-three per cent and thirty-nine per cent re- 

 spectively as compared with their normal controls (see also Fig. 

 4). Some might be inclined to find in this evidence of the " stunt- 

 ing" influence of alcohol when given to growing animals which 

 Bevan Lewis* alludes to as "a well-known fact." This I was 



strongly inclined to do at 

 first, but we are not war- 

 ranted in doing so from the 

 evidence in hand. In the 

 autumn one of my normal 

 kittens (not one of the four) 

 contracted catarrh, and her 

 growth was interrupted for 

 a time in a similar way. 

 Hence we are obliged to 

 leave this important point 

 entirely in abeyance for 

 the present. 



On the side of their psy- 

 chological development the 

 falling out of purring and play are matters of the most serious 

 import. Soon after beginning alcohol my notes abound in such 

 expressions as the following : " 1 and 3 dosing, 2, 4, (another kit- 

 ten), all playing actively" (see Fig. 5). Along with this all the 

 instincts characteristic of healthy kittens, care of coat, cleanli- 

 ness, etc., were almost wholly annulled. Fear of dogs, hunting 

 and game instincts, were completely lost. This psychic collapse, 

 developing so suddenly as it did, would seem to be directly at- 

 tributable to the influence of alcohol. At any rate, nothing of 

 the sort approaching it in either kind or degree was manifested 

 in the normal kittens during any of their periods of disease. It 

 will be wise to bear these points in mind until further confirma- 

 tion and further analysis of the experiment with kittens are pos- 

 sible. Among the animals thus far experimented with the cat 

 seems to be by far the most sensitive to the influence of alcohol. 



Fig. 5. Alci>liol-diseased kittens, 1 and 3, June 4, 

 1895: characteristic attitude. When the photo- 

 graph was taken, 5 p. m., all the normal kittens 

 were playing actively. 



* W. Bevan Lewis. A Text-Book of Mental Diseases. London, 1889, p. 306. 



