ALCOHOL AND HEREDITY 1 21 



2. Miss Anne Moore some years ago prepared an Alcoholism 

 interesting report on the feeble-minded in New York, mindedn^ss 

 and the facts set forth have a direct bearing on the 

 problem of alcoholism. She quotes from the report of 



the British Royal Commission on mental defectives, 

 and shows that it agrees with the American results. 

 The Royal Commission found that over 62 per cent of 

 all chronic inebriates were mentally defective, and that 

 such defective persons reacted to the effects of alcohol 

 more readily than normal ones. Miss Moore found 

 that alcoholism was closely connected with various 

 kinds of mental deficiency. It became a deciding factor 

 in many cases, because it brought those who had poor 

 natural endowments below the level of efficiency. Dr. 

 H. H. Goddard. in his recent (1914) book on Feeble- 

 mindedness, discusses this problem at some length. 

 He reaches the following conclusion: "Everything 

 seems to indicate that alcoholism itself is only a symp- 

 tom, that it for the most part occurs in families where 

 there is some form of neurotic taint, especially feeble- 

 mindedness. The percentage of our alcoholics that are 

 also feeble-minded is very great. Indeed, one may say 

 without fear of dispute that more people are alcoholic 

 because they are feeble-minded than vice versa." 



3. Thus the matter might have rested, but for the Experiments 

 work of the experimentalists. It is not possible to ex- ^ gum 

 periment with man, and the most carefully collected 

 statistics are open to the objection that they represent 



the effects of various causes. Dr. Charles R. Stockard 

 of New York undertook a series of investigations on 

 guinea pigs, and obtained decisive results which are now 

 famous. Guinea pigs reproduce so rapidly that it is 

 possible to have many successive generations under ob- 

 servation, and satisfy oneself that the stock used is 



