522 BIOLOGY FOR BEGINNERS 



Since writing the foregoing chapter, the people of the United 

 States have added to our Constitution the 18th amendment, 

 prohibiting the manufacture and sale of alcoholic beverages. If 

 this is properly enforced, most of the awful results of the use of 

 alcohol will disappear. It is to be hoped that, in the future, a 

 textbook will not have to contain a chapter on the evils of al- 

 cohol, any more than they would now on the evils of negro slavery. 



The final outlawing of the liquor traffic can be attributed mainly 

 to 



The long campaign of education as to its harm. 



The economic waste of materials and labor. 



The reduction in business efficiency. 



The physical and moral effects. 



COLLATERAL READING 



Alcohol and the Human Body, Horsely and Sturge, entire; A Handbook 

 of Health, Hutchinson, pp. 93-103; Physiologic Aspects of the Liquor 

 Problem, Billings; Elementary Biology, Peabody and Hunt, Pt. II, pp. 64- 

 75; The Human Mechanism, Hough and Sedgwick, pp. 366-376; The 

 Next Generation, Jewett, pp. 118-125, 145-152; Applied Physiology, 

 Overton, see index; General Physiology, Eddy, see index; Principles of 

 Health Control, Walters, pp. 130-153 and index; Civics and Health, Allen, 

 pp. 345-362; Bulletins of the Scientific Temperance Federation, Boston; 

 "Alcoholism" in Everybody's Magazine, 1909; The Great American Fraud, 

 American Medical Association, Chicago. 



SUMMARY 

 Introduction. 



Composition, C 2 H 6 O. "Ethyl" or "grain" alcohol. 

 Character, narcotic poison. (Chloroform, ether, opium.) 

 Reason for study here. Its effect as a beverage. 

 Kinds of alcoholic beverages. 



Beer, 2-5 % alcohol, made from malted barley. 



Wine, 15-20 % alcohol, made from fruit juices. 



Whiskey, 30-50 % alcohol, made from grains or fruits (fermented and 



distilled). 

 Proper uses of alcohol. 



Physical Effects of Alcohol. 



I. Alcohol not a food, because 



1. Though oxidized, it produces a net loss of energy. 



2. Does not build tissue, but harms it. 



