618 TRANSACTIONS OF THE AMERICAN INSTITUTE. 



grape is no better than other alcohol, and that its peculiar flavor 

 is due to the ingenuity of dealers. He was unwilling to believe 

 that the world had been thus far cheated into paying from $4 to 

 $6 a gallon for such an article. It is true that brandy, when 

 taken into the stomach, acts like carbon, and suspends hunger 

 and vitality without being digested. Is that the effect of poison ? 

 Is alcohol absolutely a poison? And what difference is there in 

 its effects when combined with vegetable products in the form of 

 wine? 



Mr. Bnos' Stevens upon the introduction of Mr. Dibben read 

 the following paper bearing upon this question, being the result 

 of certain investigations made by himself while employed as clerk 

 for the Massachusetts Commissioners on Sanitary Survey, more 

 particularly as to getting up an instution for feeble minded persons. 

 Among other conclusions arrived at were these : that alcohol is 

 not a producer or furnisher of nervous stimulus, but an irritator ; 

 that it is the most virulent poison in nature, and never tends to 

 cure ; that the use of one gill a day of commercial proof liquor^ 

 whether drugged or not, wastes about ten per cent of the strength 

 and activity for to-morrow. 



CONSUMPTION OF ALCOHOL BY THE HUMAN BODY. 



The use of alcoholic drinks has now become so frequent and 

 abundant by so great a portion of mankind, that I think it is a 

 proper subject of investigation by an association of persons 

 organized exclusively to study, invent, experiment with, and 

 scientifically report on mechanical constructions and operations ; 

 especially because alcohol now commonly so much affects the 

 success of the workings of the wonderful machine, the human 

 constitution. I now propose to discuss the economy of consum- 

 ing alcoholic substances by the human body, by contemplating 

 the subject in the same manner as we usually examine the com- 

 parative advantages or injuries of different kinds of lubricating 

 substances on machinery, or different kinds of fuel for steam 

 power. The facts and theories that I propose to rely on are 

 mainly drawn from the " field notes " of the Massachusetts com- 

 missioners' great sanitary survey in 184*7 and 1848, in which the 

 writer was traveling clerk and assistant examiner, wherein about 

 400 families and all their kindred to the fourth degree of con- 

 sanguinity, were reported to the Legislature, with all their ascer- 

 tainable different conditions and habits of body and mind. 



Whatever we consume in the stomach, whether fluid, liquid, or 



