726 



SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. XXXIII. No. 



most toxic of all alcoholic beverages. If whiskey 

 or cognac were always to be diluted with water 

 until the percentage of alcohol was brought down 

 to ten per cent., they would be no more toxic than 

 wine of the same strength. 



He then remarks: 



These statements would lead one to infer that 

 if the alcoholic content of all beverages was re- 

 duced to the same percentage, the toxicity of each 

 beverage would be the same. If true, such a con- 

 clusion would greatly simplify the method of 

 determining the relative harmfulness of the many 

 kinds of alcoholic beverages. 



It is easy to give a wrong impression by 

 use of sentences removed from their context. 

 Statements that precede and follow may be 

 absolutely necessary to convey an author's 

 true meaning. Had Whitney included the 

 whole of the paragraph whose beginning he 

 quotes, he could not have drawn an inference 

 which gives an incorrect impression of my 

 report. The rest of the paragraph is as fol- 

 lows: 



In fact, a number of French authorities main- 

 tain that the finest wines are, in proportion to 

 the amount of alcohol contained in them, more 

 toxic than the brandies. The question of the rela- 

 tive toxicity of the various constituents of alco- 

 holic beverages has been narrowed down to a 

 study of the action of the higher alcohols, the 

 ethers and aldehydes as compared with that of 

 ethyl alcohol. This point of view is justified for 

 the stronger beverages, such as the liqueurs, 

 brandy, rum, whiskey, etc., and the stronger wines. 

 As we have seen, however, a study of the misuse 

 of beer would have also to take account of other 

 factors. As these factors have not yet been made 

 the subject of special study, we shall confine our- 

 selves to the by-products found in spirits and 

 wines. 



Numerous other passages could be cited to 

 show that the word " all " has no place in 

 Whitney's inference. On page 23 of the re- 

 port may be read: 



The liquor sold in France under the name of 

 absinthe contains all the way from forty-seven to 

 eighty per cent, of ethyl alcohol and is highly 

 flavored with the aromatic constituents of worm- 

 wood, anise, fennel, coriander, calamus aro- 

 maticus, hyssop, marjoram, etc., the proportion 



and selection of these flavors varying with the 

 special variety of the absinthe. As long ago as 

 1865 Lancereux maiutained that alcohol is, from 

 a quantitative point of view, the chief poison of 

 absinthe. Yet there can be no doubt that if the 

 alcohol were removed from absinthe, its excessive 

 consumption would still wreck the nervous system, 

 because of the presence in large amount of the 

 aromatic constituents enumerated. 



My report had to deal principally with the 

 effect of the various constituents of alcoholic 

 beverages on the higher animals and man, 

 since the work of the Committee of Fifty con- 

 cerned itself with the problem of intemper- 

 ance. The experiments of investigators on 

 the action of the higher alcohols, esters, alde- 

 hydes and other by-products of alcoholic 

 beverages were given, as also tables showing 

 the relative killing power of these constitu- 

 ents for higher animals and statements in re- 

 gard to what was known of their action in 

 chronic alcoholism. 



From all these studies it was concluded that 

 ethyl alcohol is the preponderatingly harmful 

 ingredient of alcoholic beverages, and poison- 

 ous enough to account for all the evils of in- 

 temperance, an ingredient compared with which 

 the small quantities of higher alcohols, alde- 

 hydes, etc., associated with it in alcoholic 

 beverages may be neglected by those who seek 

 to reform these evils. Nevertheless the report 

 furnishes abundant proof that the action of 

 the various by-products or non-alcoholic con- 

 stituents of these beverages were duly con- 

 sidered so far as the data at hand at that time 

 (1899-1900) were applicable to man and the 

 higher animals. In the section of the report 

 dealing with the subject of chronic alcoholism 

 passages like the following may be read: 



The two examples that have been cited show 

 how necessary it is to study the behavior of each' 

 of the by-products in alcoholic drinks when ad- 

 ministered by itself over a long period before we 

 can attribute to each its own share of the harm- 

 fulness which ensues from the prolonged and ex- 

 cessive use of spirits, wines, etc. It is not enough 

 to know the toxic equivalent of an alcohol or of a 

 by-product as measured by the experiments de- 

 tailed in the preceding section in order to deter- 



° Italics as in the original. 



