“The doctor said: ‘I should be very sorry for any harm to come to you. You know I am a doctor, and I will be constantly at hand to see if any of you are going wrong, and I promise that if I see any of you breaking down I will at once stop my experiment.’ And then taking out of his pocket ten crisp five-pound notes, he displayed them to the anchor smiths. ‘I will put down these notes, £50 in all; six of you shall try water for one week honestly and fairly; if you pull through without giving in, the £50 shall be yours; if not, I’ll take the £50 back again. Is it a bargain?’
“This clenched the matter, and very soon the doctor’s offer was accepted, and a gang of six men volunteered to begin their work on the Monday without beer. The beer drinkers did their best to chaff the water drinkers, and aggravated them by taking good care to show them how very nice it was to have recourse to unlimited beer. The water drinkers kept firm, and the first day, to their astonishment, found that they could do just as much work as the rest of their mates. On Tuesday the water drinkers began to crow over the beer drinkers, for they found that, while the latter complained and grumbled at the heat, they were enabled to take the work in a philosophical kind of way. Wednesday, Thursday and Friday wore away, and the teetotal band became more and more triumphant, the laugh was all on their side, for not only did they feel more comfortable than their beer-loving companions, but the £50 came nearer and nearer, and at last, on Saturday, when the time for finishing work came, they threw down their tools and their hammers, and crowded up to the doctor to claim the prize, and to give a faithful record of their experiences; and one and all declared that they had done their hard work with more ease and comfort to themselves than ever it had been done before, and, instead of feeling tired and jaded, as they often did on the Saturday afternoon, they were quite ready to begin work again, and if the doctor had another £50 to dispose of, they would most gladly give him a chance of protracting his experiment for another week. The doctor expressed himself perfectly satisfied with the trial which had already taken place, and left the place amidst three hearty cheers, while the men proceeded to discuss the ins and outs of the matter among themselves.”—National Advocate.
BEER-DRINKING INJURES HEALTH.
“I think there is no doubt that beer-drinking is deleterious to health, and personally I have never seen any case of disease where I thought it useful. I believe it is more deleterious to health than the stronger spirits, and this opinion is derived from the report of the actuaries’ investigations for our insurance companies a few years ago.”—Dr. John M. Dodson, Dean of the Medical Department of the University of Chicago.
“My connection with large medical institutions for many years past has given me, I think, an excellent opportunity to observe the effect of beer-drinking and the use of other alcoholic liquors in many cases. I can say as a result of my own observation that beer-drinking has a very pernicious effect upon nearly every organ of the body. It produces disease of the stomach and digestive tract, of the heart and circulating system, of the kidneys and liver, and of the nervous system. In addition to this it lessens the vigor and vital resistance of the whole body, makes the beer drinker very much more susceptible to infection such as pneumonia, and other acute infections, and also lessens his ability to recover from illnesses of any kind. An untold amount of misery and disease would be avoided if the use of beer and other intoxicating liquors could be wiped off the face of the earth.”—Dr. W. H. Riley, Battle Creek Sanitarium, Battle Creek, Mich.
In the report of Bellevue Hospital, New York City, for 1904, Dr. Alexander Lambert, in speaking of delirium tremens, says: “The delirium tremens from beer does not come on so readily as that from whisky, but is slower in clearing up.” Page 138 of report.
“Apart from its toxic effect it is seldom realized how harmful beer may be by promoting obesity, and, in susceptible persons, favoring dilatation of the stomach.”—Dr. E. P. Joslin, Professor in Harvard Medical School.
“It is not the concentrated alcoholic liquors alone that cause heart and kidney trouble but pre-eminently the continued immoderate use of beer. Nothing is more false than the belief that the progressive dislodgement of other alcoholic drinks by beer will diminish the destructive influences of alcoholism. * * * It has been conclusively established by thousandfold experiments that soldiers in all climates, in heat, cold and rain, endure best the most fatiguing marches when they are absolutely deprived of alcoholic drinks.”—Prof. G. Von Bunge, M. D., Basle, Switzerland.
“Beer, wine and spirits furnish no element capable of entering into the composition of blood, muscular fibre, or anything which is the seat of vital principle. If a man drinks daily 8 or 10 quarts of the best Bavarian beer in a year he will have taken into his system as much nourishment as is contained in a five-pound loaf of bread.”—Liebig, the great German chemist.
“Beer-drinker’s heart is a term well-known to the physicians of our large hospitals, and indicates a special condition of unhealthy enlargement of the heart due to dilatation, accompanied by some increase of tissue and of fat. Doctors Bauer and Bollinger found that in Munich one in every sixteen of the hospital patients died from this disorder. It is common in Germany—the land of beer-drinking—and proves incontestably that the habit of drinking even such a mild alcoholic beverage as lager-beer is one that is undesirable and unwise.”—From “Alcohol and the Human Body,” by Sir Victor Horsley, M. D., London.