The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1878-05-25 00:00:00

ALCOHOLIC DRINKS.

In reply to a letter from "Inquirer," on the subject of
Alcoholic Drinks, The Times publishes the following :
Sir,—lf "Inquirer "will forward to me his address,
I will send him a copy of my paper on "Alcoholic
Drinks." If he will take the trouble to read it, he
will find that the teachings of science have not left the
matter "as far from settlement as ever." Science
tells us most clearly that the use of alcohol in health
is necessarily hurtful, and observation shows us that
men and women shorten their lives without knowing
it by its daily use.

" Inquirer " uses the arguments which have always
been held against sanitary laws. Because some one among
us have escaped from the effects of an evil influence
therefore there is none such; because some drinkers
have lived to old age, therefore (say they) drinking is
not an evil. We might argue just as soundly that as
the Duke of Wellington lived to a good old age, and
died at last in his own bed, there is no danger to life in
active service against an enemy.
We cannot prove the safety of moderate drinking by
citing the evidence of those who live to old age in spite
of it; but we can prove the deadly influence which it
has upon the human body by the distinct evidence
afforded by the mortuary of any general hospital,
which tells us by unmistakable testimony that the
person who habitually uses alcohol, as at present
h supplied, saps the foundation of is health and
shortens his life; and that its administration to our
children tends to produce a race of individuals who
are naturally weak both in mind and body, and who
have shorter lives than their fathers.

" Inquirer " would probably object to the facts being
applied to the human family which are well known to
the breeders of animals, but they are already acted
upon by insurance companies in assessing the value of
a given life. If the use of alcohol as a diet were
abolished for all persons under 50, our grandchildren
would find the length of life much beyond that which
is settled by Dr. Farr as the average to which men
now live. If " Inquirer " lives in a district in which
chalk water is habitually used, and if he will look
into the way in which the pipes of a hot-water appa-
ratus are gradually rendered useless, he may under-
stand something of the way in which alcohol is sapping
his own health. There is a gradual accumulation of
matter in the wrong place. If the householder is
careful to remove the deposit from the pipes at regular
intervals, no harm results beyond the expense and the
temporary inconvenience which arises from the
machine being out of gear; but let him omit to do this,
and sooner or later there is a stoppage, perhaps an ex-
plosion. He would not use the chalk water if he
could avoid it for such purposes.
So it is with the habitual use of alcohol. A material
is produced in the blood which, like to the cloudiness
which arises from boiling chalk-water, must be de-
posited somewhere. It may. be removed by vital
animal power if in moderate quantity. but no one can
tell when that quantity is exceeded. It is surely wiser
not to foul the machine than to reduce it to a condi-
tion of impurity and danger. Science teaches
this AEI a truth. It has only been known within
the last few years. It is true that there is a vital
power in the human body which a hot-water appa-
ratus does not possess, but that power is not per-
petual, and must not be taxed beyond a certain limit.
or it fails to act. I contend that, as alcohol is not i
necessary of life, it is better not to tax the machine
at all and to give up its habitual use.—l am, Sir,
your obedient servant,
ALFRED CARPENTER; M.D.
Croydon, May 15.

A soldier has just died at Marseilles from the pres-
sure of a bunch of hair upon the brain. It is supposed that
in infancy a portion of his locks were forced into the skin,
and thence grew inwards until the fatal result was produced.
This is the second case within 50 years.

An Englishman in Nevada proposes, if 250,000
dollars can be raised, to bore two artesian wells, eighteen
inches apart, the one a six and the other a four inch bore, to
a depth of 6,C00 feet. Then he will drop into one a powder
cartridge wrapped' in asbestos, s ) that subterranean heat
will not explode it until it reaches the bottom. The ex-
plosion will then unite the two wells, and water poured
down one will be converted by subterranean heat into steam
and sent out through the other, where the power can. he
transmitted to any reqnired point. So, at least, says a re-
porter of the Virginia City _Enterprise.
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_
Captain Sir George Nares is named for a second
command of the discovery ship Alert. This cruise will not,
however, be to the North, the Antarctic rather than tale
Arctic being the intended scene of her future explorations.