NARCOTICS 203 



for crimes committed in drink. Alexander died drunk. So 

 intemperate was his court that it is almost a matter of 

 surprise that any members of it survived. The Romans were 

 as drunken as the Greeks. The intemperance of the Gauls 

 and Germans was a by-word in the ancient world. It in- 

 creased to a frightful extent when the monks added to the 

 alcoholic supply by planting vines for sacramental purposes 

 round the monasteries, and so introduced the culture of the 

 grape. To-day the average Frenchman or German of the 

 vine regions is as temperate as an average Jew or Italian. 

 England has always been comparatively drunken. Since 

 the supply of alcohol has never been so plentiful as on parts 

 of the Continent, the elimination of the unfit has been less 

 thorough, and the evolution less complete. Nevertheless, 

 though the purchasing power of the nation has increased 

 out of all proportion to any rise in the price of alcohol, we 

 do not, at the present day, witness the tremendous orgies 

 which were common in former times. With every oppor- 

 tunity to be drunken the great majority of Englishmen are 

 now temperate. 



343. In the history of most nations have happened 

 occasional outbursts of intemperance due to increased 

 facilities for procuring alcohol, or to a loosening of the 

 general moral tone. The fact has caused some critics to 

 argue that there is no such thing as evolution against 

 alcohol. It is hardly necessary to deal with this objection 

 at length. To ascertain the existence of evolution we must 

 not compare decade with decade, but century with century, 

 and we must not neglect to assign the proper value to 

 collateral circumstances. The strength of the predisposition 

 to intemperance is not the only thing which determines the 

 amount of the consumption of alcohol. Many causes other 

 than evolution have been assigned for the comparative 

 drunkenness or sobriety of different races. 



344 Climate. Since the South Europeans dwell in a 

 warm-temperate climate, extremes of heat and cold have 

 been supposed to predispose to drunkenness. But a hundred 

 savage races, whose ancestral supplies of alcohol were scanty, 

 are drunken in much the same kind of climate as that in 

 which the South Europeans are now temperate. Jews and 

 South Europeans were formerly drunken in their present 

 environment. They are now temperate in every climate to 

 which they travel. West Africans are temperate under the 

 equator. 



345. Potency of the national beverages. Strong solutions of 



