ol for over thirty years, I am familiar with its
tendencies and its dangers."

Dr. T. D. Crothers of Hartford, Conn., in an article upon "The Decline
of Alcohol as a Medicine," says:--

"Thoughtful observers recognize that alcohol as a medicine is
rapidly becoming a thing of the past. Ten years ago leading
medical men and text-books spoke of stimulants as essentials of
many diseases, and defended their use with warmth and
positiveness. To-day this is changed. Medical men seldom refer
to spirits as remedies, and when they do, express great
conservatism and caution. The text-books show the same changes,
although some dogmatic authors refuse to recognize the change of
practice, and still cling to the idea of the food value of
spirits.

"Druggists who supply spirits to the profession recognize a
tremendous dropping off in the demand. A distiller who, ten
years ago, sold many thousand gallons of choice whiskies, almost
exclusively to medical men, has lost his trade altogether, and
gone out of business. Wine men, too, recognize this change, and
are making every effort to have wine used in the place of
spirits in the sick-room. Proprietary medicine dealers are
putting all sorts of compounds of wine with iron, bark, etc., on
the market with the same idea. It is doubtful if any of these
will be able to secure any permanent place in therapeutics.

"The fact is, alcohol is passing out of practical therapeutics
because its real action is becoming known. Facts are
accumulating in the laboratory, in the autopsy room, at the
bedside, and in the work of experimental psychologists, which
show that alcohol is a depressant and a narcotic; that it cannot
build up tissue, but always acts as a degenerative power; and
that its apparent effects of raising the heart's action and
quickening functional activities are misleading and erroneous.

"French and German specialists have denounced spirits both as a
beverage and a medicine, and shown by actual demonstration that
alcohol is a poison and a depressant, and that any therapeutic
action it is assumed to have is open to question.

"All this is not the result of agitation and wild condemnation
by persons who feel deeply the sad consequences of the abuse of
spirits. It is simply the outcome of the gradual accumulation of
facts that have been pro