Alcoholism 

 Alphabet 



SCIENTIFIC SIDE-LIGHTS 



28 



138. ALCOHOLISM IN THE FRONT 

 RANK OF DISEASES Prevention of Dis- 

 ease Now the Watchword of Physicians 

 The Etiological Epoch in Medicine. The 

 present epoch is rightly termed the etiologi- 

 cal in medicine. We physicians now ac- 

 knowledge that recognition of the causes of 

 disease is one of the highest problems of 

 our investigation, because we have become 

 aware that by this means we pave the way 

 not merely for the cure of disease, but also 

 for the far more important prevention of 

 disease. But how many causes of disease 

 can be found that for extent and impor- 

 tance are at all comparable to chronic alco- 

 hol intoxication? At the most there are 

 two infectious diseases, tuberculosis and 

 syphilis, that can be ranked with alcoholism 

 in these respects. But how much more com- 

 prehensible, more manifest, more accessible 

 to research and to medical influence are the 

 effects of this chemical substance exactly 

 known, as compared with the complicated 

 biological influences of the parasite micro- 

 organisms! STRUMPELL Ueber die Alko- 

 holfrage vom drztlichen Standpunkt. 

 (Translated for Scientific Side-Lights.) 



139. ALCOHOL PRODUCES CRIMINAL 

 HEREDITY The Ancestry of Paris Prisoners. 

 I have stated that the prisons are in- 

 habited by degenerates. I might just as 

 well have said, and with as much right, 

 that they are inhabited by the sons of alco- 

 holics. If, in the case of a criminal, we can- 

 not refer to insanity, or hysteria, or epi- 

 lepsy in the ancestry, we make inquiries re- 

 garding alcohol, and in nine cases out of 

 ten we find that to be the root of the evil. 

 LAURENT Les Habitues des Prisons de Paris, 

 p. 21. (Translated for Scientific Side- 

 Lights.) 



140. ALCOHOL VS. NUTRITION-Pn- 



vation a Cause of Intemperance The Mo- 

 rality of Cookery. An instructive experi- 

 ence of my own will illustrate this. When 

 wandering alone through Norway in 1856, I 

 lost the track in crossing the Kjolen fjeld, 

 struggled on for twenty-three hours without 

 food or rest, and arrived in sorry plight at 

 Lorn, a very wild region. After a few hours' 

 rest I pushed on to a still wilder region and 

 still rougher quarters, and continued thus 

 to the great Jostedal table-land, an un- 

 broken glacier of 500 square miles; then 

 descended the Jostedal itself to its opening 

 on the Sogne fjord five days of extreme 

 hardship with no other food than flatbrod 

 (very coarse oatcake) and bilberries gath- 

 ered on the way, varied on one occasion 

 with the luxury of two raw turnips. Then 

 I reached a comparatively luxurious station 

 (Ronnei), where ham and eggs and claret 

 were obtainable. The first glass of claret 

 produced an effect that alarmed me a crav- 

 ing for more and for stronger drink, that 

 was almost irresistible. I finished a bottle 

 of St. Julien, and nothing but a violent ef- 



fort of will prevented me from then order- 

 ing brandy. 



I attribute this to the exhaustion con- 

 sequent upon the excessive work and insuffi- 

 cient, unsavory food of the previous five 

 days; have made many subsequent obser- 

 vations on the victims of alcohol, and have 

 no doubt that overwork and scanty, tasteless 

 food is the primary source of the craving 

 for strong drink that so largely prevails 

 with such deplorable results among the class 

 that is the most exposed to such privation. 

 I do not say that this is the only source of 

 such depraved appetite. It may also be 

 engendered by the opposite extreme of ex- 

 cessive luxurious pandering to general sen- 

 suality. 



The practical inference suggested by this 

 experience and these observations is, that 

 speech-making, pledge-signing, and blue- 

 ribbon missions can only effect temporary 

 results unless supplemented by satisfying 

 the natural appetite of hungry people by 

 supplies of food that are not only nutri- 

 tious, but savory and varied. Such food 

 need be no more expensive than that which 

 is commonly eaten by the poorest of Eng- 

 lishmen, but it must be far better cooked. 

 WILLIAMS Chemistry of Cookery, ch. 5, p. 

 60. (A., 1900.) 



141. ALCOHOL WEAKENS VOLITION 



Morbid Physical Craving Physical 

 Remedies for Drunkenness Seclusion 

 Absolute Abstinence. It is the physical 

 craving produced by the continued action of 

 the stimulant upon the nutrition of the 

 nervous system which renders the condition 

 of the habitual drunkard one with which it 

 is peculiarly difficult to deal by purely 

 moral means. Vain is it to recall the mo- 

 tives for a better course of conduct to one 

 who is already familiar with them all, but 

 is destitute of the will to act upon them; 

 the seclusion of such persons from the reach 

 of alcoholic liquors, for a sufficient length 

 of time to free the blood from its contam- 

 ination, to restore the healthful nutrition of 

 the brain, and to enable the recovered 

 mental vigor to be wisely directed, seems to 

 afford the only prospect of reformation; 

 and this cannot be expected to be perma- 

 nent unless the patient determinately 

 adopts and steadily acts on the resolution 

 to abstain entirely from that which, if 

 again indulged in, will be poison alike to 

 his body and to his mind, and will transmit 

 its pernicious influence to his offspring. 

 CARPENTER Mental Physiology, bk. ii, ch. 

 17, p. 653. (A., 1900.) 



142. ALCOHOL, WHAT IS A HARM- 

 LESS DOSE OF ? That for alcohol, as for 

 all other medicinal agents of the same order, 

 there may be a dose the effects of which may 

 pass unperceived which may not diminish 

 the elasticity of our organs there can be no 

 doubt. But what is this dose ? The deter- 

 mination of it is very difficult; it varies 

 with the individual, with the disposition at 



