148 Proceedings of the Royal Society of Victoria. 



injured by the excessive use of .alcohol. Some of them practised 

 allied vices (opium and chloroform). If the thirteen be included, 

 the percentage rises to about twenty-three. The great majority 

 of the thirteen are now deceased, and their deaths were certainly 

 hastened by the same causes. 



In the Ufiiversity Calendar for 188.3-84 there are eighty -six 

 Bachelors of Medicine on the list, of whom ten, or about twelve 

 per cent., certainly used alcohol in excess, and were much injured 

 thereby in every respect. Some of these ten are included in the 

 thirteen above mentioned, but several of the thirteen had died in 

 the interval. 



In the University Calendar for 1885-86 there are 106 Bachelors 

 of Medicine on the list, of whom twelve, or about eleven per 

 cent, became distinct alcoholics. 



In all these cases the habits of intemperance began, I believe, 

 subsequent to their entry into student life, in most cases they 

 were not pronounced until leaving it. Whatever may be the 

 value of these figures the real truth is, if anything, understated. 

 The diminution in the percentage in the more recent years may, 

 or may not be fallacious ; it may be due possibly to increasing 

 civilisation in the colony, or it may be due on the other hand to 

 the shortness of the interval which has elapsed, and consequent 

 anticipation of results. Further, I find it much more difiicult to 

 trace the movements of the more numerous graduates in recent 

 years. 



Again emphasising the fact that the conclusion may be under- 

 stated, but is certainly not overstated, it can only be described as 

 appalling. That such a number of men who have been reared, as 

 Carlyle puts it, "at infinite trouble and expense," and who have 

 qualified themselves by a course of long and severe study to 

 practice a most interesting profession, should then pass into the 

 world to obstruct, and not assist, social progress, to become 

 not objects of respect, as cultivated and useful citizens, but a by- 

 word and reproach, can only excite the most profound dismay. 



Be it observed that the figures in themselves warrant no 

 conclusion whatever on the vexed question, whether alcohol is 

 the cause or the consequence of destruction, or both. Whether, 

 in other words, alcoholism is a symptom of moral deterioration, or 

 whether moral deterioration is a symptom of alcoholism, or 



