le this is sufficiently deplorable, its
effect on the mind is by far the more serious. No idea is more false
than that a small amount of alcohol aids in the performance of work of
any sort, and experience in the army, navy, and in exploring expeditions
all go to show that the use of alcohol in any form reduces the capacity,
both for activity and endurance. As a protection against cold, it is
worse than useless, and the feeling of warmth which drinking alcohol in
any form produces, does not manufacture heat in the body, but is rather
a source of danger on account of the reaction of the whole system.

_Tobacco._

The use of tobacco may or may not be injurious to the human system, and
it is said by those accustomed to its use that it is for them a source
of great enjoyment and comfort. The essential poison of tobacco is known
as nicotine, and experiments are very readily made with this substance,
extracted from the plant, to show its deadly character on the heart and
nerve cells of animals. It is easy to demonstrate that the use of
tobacco affects the heart, since the common "out-of-breath feeling"
which comes to users of tobacco when climbing hills or running is well
known. No young man training for an athletic event would think of
smoking, on account of the danger to his wind.

No boy should smoke, because nothing should be allowed to interfere with
the fullest development of the heart and nervous system, and without
question tobacco is a potent factor in influencing both. In many
individual cases it has been shown that the use of tobacco in excess has
a bad effect on digestion, while in other cases the trembling hand and
inattentive mind indicate the result on the nervous system. No general
law or rule can be laid down, and each man must act as his own
individual constitution seems to require.

_The drug habit._

The use of drugs is, in some cases, so persistent and leads to such dire
results that it is well worth while to enter a protest against such
practices. The poor creatures who have become fast victims of the
morphine habit or the opium habit or the cocaine habit, or of any one
of a dozen which might be named, will not be affected by anything that
may be said here. But a word of warning may serve to restrain those who
are only at the beginning of this downward path of which the end is
positive and certain. The use of drugs once begun is sure to increase
until, stupefied by their action, the victim becomes a