The examinations made for the Post Office Department revealed the fact
that a great many of the so-called medicines on the market were
intoxicating beverages in disguise. The Internal Revenue Department then
took up the matter and a long list of these beverage medicines was sent
out to internal revenue agents with instructions that these must not be
sold henceforth unless by persons paying a special tax for the sale of
alcoholic beverages.

Some of the manufacturers of these nostrums availed themselves of
opportunity given to add a recognized medicinal agent to their flavored
alcohol and water and such preparations were stricken from the list of
those requiring a whisky license for their sale. Peruna and Hostetter's
Bitters were the best-known of these. Peruna had been up to this time
what government chemists called "a cheap cocktail." The report of the
pure food commissioner of North Dakota for 1906 gives on page 157 an
analysis of it as now upon the market: "Alcohol by volume, 21.25 per
cent.; total solids, 3.846 per cent.; ash, .158 per cent." The report
says:--

"The only thing of a medicinal nature that we could find in this
preparation appeared to be a small amount of senna combined with
a bitters of some kind."

Proprietary "Foods" have not escaped attention from chemists. Dr.
Charles Harrington, for several years secretary of Massachusetts Board
of Health, was the first to publish an analysis of these preparations
showing their alcoholic strength and their small nutritive content. He
lists "foods" examined by him as follows:--

"Liquid Peptonoids 23.03 alcohol; maximum amount recommended
will yield less than one ounce of nutriment per day, and the
equivalent of 3.50 oz. of whisky. Hemapeptone 10.60 alcohol;
Hemaboloids 15.81 alcohol; the maximum dose recommended yields
about 1/4 oz. of nutriment, and the equivalent of about 1-1/2
oz. of whisky daily. Tonic Beef 15.58 alcohol; doses recommended
yield about 1/2 oz. nutriment daily, and the equivalent of one
ounce of whiskey. Mulford's Predigested Beef 19.72 alcohol;
doses recommended yield about 1-1/4 oz. nutriment daily, and the
alcoholic equivalent of about 6 oz. of whisky. There were
"Foods" for the sick examined which were non-alcoholic, but
their nutritive value was about nothing in comparison to their
cost."

The Committee on Pharmacy of the American Medical Association reports on
the f