88 TOBACCO AND ITS EFFECTS. 



enforcement be at once restored.' . . . An agent . . . that is act- 

 ually capable of such potent evil, . . . which determines func- 

 tional disease of the heart, which impairs vision, blunts the 

 memory, and interferes with mental effort and application, ought, 

 in my opinion as a sanitary officer, at whatever cost of vigilance, 

 to be rigorously interdicted. . . . The difficulty of restraining 

 smoking should be no more valid excuse for its tolerance, in the 

 face of sanitary objections of such magnitude, than for the tolera- 

 tion of ' frenching or gouging or hazing.' The use of stimulating 

 liquors is forbidden, but that the regulation prohibiting it is evaded 

 is shown by the empty whiskey bottles which are picked up outside 

 the cadets' quarters ; but it is not proposed to allow drinking on 

 this account, although, as a sanitary fact, a half-pint of table claret 

 or of beer would be a wiser indulgence than a cigar, or the in- 

 numerable cigarettes, — which latter, there is good reason to be- 

 lieve, cause injury to the health from other agents than the mere 

 tobacco which they may contain. 



" I have dwelt at such length on this topic, feeling assured that 

 I shall have done no act of greater good to this school, in the suc- 

 cess of which I have so profound an interest, than if I can succeed 

 in saving its pupils from the impairment of health which is sure to 

 result from the unrestrained premature use of tobacco." 



We doubt not that many a parent in this broad land 

 thanked Dr. Gihon, from his inmost heart, for the exhibit 

 of the evils following on the use of tobacco by growing 

 boys, however robust, made in the paper from which the 

 above extracts are quoted. And Rear-Admiral Rodgers 

 deserved their gratitude no less when he issued the follow- 

 ing order, which explains itself : — 



" U. S. Naval Academy, Annapolis, Md., Jicne 14, 1881. 

 " Order No. i. 



" The experiment of permitting the Naval Cadets to smoke at 

 the Naval Academy, having been fairly tried for nearly three years, 

 has been found injurious to their health, discipline, and powers of 

 study. 



" The Medical Officers of the Academy, and the Academic Board, 



