mically with the addition of a small dose of alcohol proved an
efficient means of combating the pernicious effects of low temperatures.
Coffee prepared by boiling, and tea, showed negative effects.

The value of coffee as a strength-conserver, and its function of
increasing endurance, morale, and healthfulness, was demonstrated by the
great stress which the military authorities, in the late and in previous
wars, placed upon furnishing the soldiers with plenty of good coffee,
particularly at times when they were under the greatest strain. Various
articles[199] record this fact; and these statements are further borne
out by the data given below in the discussion of the physiological
effects of caffein, to which the majority of the stimulating effects of
coffee may be attributed.

According to Fauvel,[200] with a healthy patient on a vegetable diet,
chocolate and coffee increase the excretion of purins, diminishing the
excretion of uric acid and apparently hindering the precipitation of
uric acid in the organism. This diminution, however, was not due to
retention of uric acid in the organism.

"Habit-forming" is one of the adjectives often used in describing
coffee, but it is a fact that coffee is much less likely than alcoholic
liquors to cause ill effects. A man rarely becomes a slave of coffee;
and excessive drinking of this beverage never produces a state of moral
irresponsibility or leads to the commission of crime. Dr. J.W.
Mallet,[201] in testimony given before a Federal Court, stated that
caffein and coffee were not habit-forming in the correct sense of the
term. His definition of the expression is that the habit formed must be
a detrimental and injurious one--one which becomes so firmly fixed upon
a person forming it that it is thrown off with great difficulty and with
considerable suffering, continuous exercise of the habit increasing the
demand for the habit-forming drug. It is well known that the desire
ceases in a very short period of time after cessation of use of
caffein-containing beverages, so that in that sense, coffee is not
habit-forming.

[Illustration: MEN AND WOMEN LABORERS PICKING COFFEE ON A SAO PAULO
ESTATE]

[Illustration: SACKING COFFEE IN A WAREHOUSE AT THE PORT OF SANTOS]

[Illustration: PICKING AND SACKING COFFEE IN BRAZIL]

It has been shown by Gourewitsch[202] that the daily administration of
coffee produces a certain degree of tolerance, and that the doses must
be increased to obta