30 THE COMMON SENSE OF THE MILK QUESTION 



utory cause, of lacteal failure in the human species, 

 it would be rash to conclude that they are not in 

 any manner related. 



Another explanation, and one which seems to 

 the writer quite fantastic, is that offered by Professor 

 von Bunge, to whose valuable and monumental 

 researches reference has already been made. He 

 suggests that the decline of nursing ability is a sign 

 of hereditary degeneracy, passing from mothers to 

 daughters and caused mainly by alcoholism, usually 

 that of the fathers.^' It is an interesting theory, 

 doubtless containing important elements of truth, 

 but, with all the deference due to such a profound 

 scholar and patient investigator, it is impossible to 

 resist the belief that the much overworked theory of 

 heredity has once more been conveniently resorted 

 to for explanation of a phenomenon which can only 

 be properly explained upon other grounds. From 

 the time of Hippocrates to the present the heredi- 

 tary transmission of alcoholic taint has been held 

 to be responsible for all kinds of degeneracy .^^ The 

 deformity of Vulcan as a result of Jupiter's intem- 

 perance marks the antiquity of the belief. In any 

 case, it is by no means certain that the decay of the 

 lacteal function in the human species is a sign of 

 degeneracy, any more than that the decay of the 

 vermiform appendix is a sign of degeneracy. 



With this brief survey of some of the most impor- 



