i64 A STUDY IN HEREDITY 



eliminated, a race which had undergone alcoholic 

 evolution would degenerate towards the ancestral 

 type, and become increasingly prone to drunken- 

 ness.' If the Prohibition were continued long 

 enough, that primitive condition would be repro- 

 duced in which the proneness to drunkenness was 

 as great as it is among those modern savages who 

 have never commanded an appreciable supply of 

 alcohol. We have seen that alcoholic evolution is 

 possible to primitive peoples only when the supply 

 of alcohol is scanty and dilute, as, judging by the 

 analogy of modern savages, it must have been in 

 the ancient world. With the strong and plentiful 

 alcohol of modern civilisation the death-rate of 

 primitive peoples becomes so high that they undergo, 

 not evolution, but extinction, as has happened times 

 and again in the Western Hemisphere. To be 

 beneficial, therefore, Prohibition must be eternal. 

 It must endure as long as the human race endures. 

 Temporary Prohibition can result ultimately in great 

 disaster, in greatly increased drunkenness only. 

 In the face of an increasing capacity for enjoying 

 drink, how could we secure this immortal per- 

 manence for a mortal law ? What guarantee is 

 theret hat a future generation of alcoholic de- 

 generates would not repeal it ? It is possible that 



^ In like manner, the negroes of North America must in time lose 

 their powers of resistance against malaria. 



