Tobacco and Alcohol

44

Lewes, loc. cit.

45

A good summary will be found in the American Journal of Medical Sciences, July, 1859.

46

Chemistry of Common Life, vol. I., p. 288.

47

Except that of contemporary physiologists. Among these there are few greater names than that of Moleschott; whose testimony to the strengthening properties of alcohol may be found in his Lehre der Nahrungsmitiel, p. 162.

48

We presume Mr. Parton thinks these three unprofessional opinions enough to outweigh the all but unanimous testimony of physicians to the tonic effects of beer, wine and brandy.

49

Anstie, op. cit. pp. 381 – 385.

50

In view of these and similar facts, Dr. Anstie remarks that "the effect of nutritious food, where it can be digested, is undistinguishable from that of alcohol upon the abnormal conditions of the nervous system which prevail in febrile diseases." p. 385. For the use of wine or brandy in infantile typhoid and typhus, see Hillier on Diseases of Children, a most admirable work.

51

See Chambers, Digestion and its Derangements, p. 249; and in general, Johnston, Von Bibra, and the paper of Dr. Hammond above referred to.

52

Carpenter, Human Physiology, p. 387.

53

Anstie, op. cit., p. 359.

54

Baudot, De la Destruction de l'Alcool dans l'Organisme, Union Médicale, Nov. et Déc., 1863. See also the elaborate criticism in Anstie, op. cit., pp. 358-370.

55

De la Digestion des Boissons Alcooliques, in Annales de Chimie et de Physique, 1847, tom. xxi.

56

Ueber das Verhalten des Alkohols im thierischen Organismus, in Vierteljahrsschrift für die praktische Heilkunde, Prague, 1833.

57

See Moleschott, Circulation de la Vie, tom. ii. p. 6.

58

So decisive is the paralyzing power of a narcotic dose of alcohol upon the stomach in some cases, that we have seen a drunken man vomit scarcely altered food which, it appeared, had been eaten fourteen hours before. The sum and substance of the above argument is that, as the narcotic dose of alcohol prevents the digestion of other food, it will also prevent the digestion of itself.

59

In typhoid and typhus the "poison-line" of alcohol is shifted, so that large quantities may be taken without risk of narcosis. Women, in this condition, have been known to consume 36 oz. of brandy (containing 18 oz. of alcohol) per diem.

60

It is not certain, however, that alcoholic drinks, as usually taken, materially retard the waste of tissue. These drinks contain but from 2 to 50 per cent of alcohol; the remainder being chiefly water, which is a great accelerator of waste. The weight-sustaining power of brandy, or especially of wine and ale, can, therefore, perhaps be hardly accounted for without admitting a true food-action.

61

Dalton, Human Physiology, p. 363.

62

Payen, Substances Alimentaires, p. 482.

63

The liquid food may be taken in the shape of free water, or of water contained in the tissues of succulent vegetables. See Pereira, Treatise on Food and Diet, p. 277.

64

Physiological Memoirs, Philadelphia, 1863, p. 48.

65

Anstie, op. cit. p. 388.

66

Brinton, Treatise on Food and Digestion; and Cornhill Magazine, Sept. 1862; cited in the pamphlet of Gov. Andrew, above-mentioned.

67

Liebig, Letters on Chemistry, p. 454.

68

Anstie, op. cit. p. 401.