ry in this connection; it shows that out of 1,042
cases treated with alcoholics 386 died, while out of the same
number treated without alcohol only 81 died. Using plain English
305 were actually killed by it."

Dr. T. D. Crothers, in the January, 1899, _Bulletin of the American
Medical Temperance Association_, gave the following Hospital Statistics,
showing a decline in the use of spirits in hospitals:--

"Evidently a great change is going on in the use of alcohol as a
remedy in large hospitals. The annual reports of ten hospitals
in the New England and the Middle States show the following
widely varying figures. The spirits used include beers, wines,
whiskies and brandies, and vary from eleven to sixty-one cents a
person for all the cases treated. These hospitals treat from
eighty to seven hundred cases a year, both surgical and medical,
and the medical staff are the leading physicians of the towns
and cities where they are located. The hospital where the
largest amount of spirits was used is not different from others,
nor is the one where the lowest amount is reported. The
conclusion is that this difference is due entirely to the
judgment of the medical men. The lowest rate (eleven cents each)
was in a hospital where one hundred and twenty-one cases had
been under treatment. The highest rate (sixty-one cents) was in
a hospital of five hundred and forty cases. The mortality from
typhoid fever and pneumonia was eight per cent. higher in this
hospital than in the one where only eleven cents a head had been
expended for spirits. The general mortality did not vary greatly
in any of these hospitals, and the records of one year could not
be expected to show this. In the remaining hospitals the
mortality of the fever and the septic cases was about the same.
The free use of spirits did not show any improvement, but rather
an increase of the death-rate, while the same amount of spirits
used showed but little change, and that in the line of
improvement of death-rate. These are only the figures of one
year, but they indicate a change of practice, and show the
passing of alcohol as a remedy."

CHAPTER XI.

REASONS WHY ALCOHOL IS DANGEROUS AS MEDICINE.

In the chapter upon "The Effects of Alcohol upon the Human Body" are
cited some of the reasons assigned by scientific investigators for their
di