326 THE PBESENT EVOLUTION OF MAN — MENTAL 



be in the direction of an increasing power of tolerating 

 the poison, or in the direction of an increasing power of 

 avoiding it, that is, of abstaining from it, or both, i. c. 

 it may result in an increased power of imbibing alcohol 

 without ill effects, or it may result in a diminution of 

 the craving for it, or both. In the presence of an 

 abundant supply of alcohol and of a craving for it, it can 

 hardly result to any great extent in an increased power 

 of toleration, for, under such circumstances, the drunkard 

 would simply drink more, and thereby poison himself 

 as effectually as a less resistant person would with a 

 smaller quantity. The evolution against alcohol must 

 therefore be in the direction of an increased power of 

 avoiding it — in a diminution of the craving for it. A 

 priori, therefore, we should expect that races that have 

 long been familiar with alcohol, like races that have 

 long been familiar with a very prevalent and deadly 

 disease, are less harmfully affected by it than races that 

 have had little or no experience of it, and this because 

 they crave less for it, and therefore drink less of it. A 

 posterim'i, this is exactly what we do find. The peoples 

 inhabiting the northern coast of the Mediterranean, the 

 Greeks, the Italians, the South Frenchmen, and the 

 Spaniards, who have lived for thousands of years in the 

 presence of an abundant supply of alcohol, are pre- 

 eminently temperate, whereas savages of all races, who 

 have had no racial experience of it, or a slight experience 

 only, the natives of North and South America, Australia, 

 Polynesia, Africa, Greenland, &c., whether inhabiting 

 the Arctic, the Temperate, or the Torrid zone, crave 

 for it to such a degree that, unless we protect them 

 by prohibitory laws, they perish in its presence. More- 

 over, races that, in their experience of alcohol, are 

 intermediate between the Italian and the North 

 American Indians, crave for alcohol, and are inclined 

 to excessive indulgence in it, niore than the former and 



