Page:Alcohol, a Dangerous and Unnecessary Medicine.djvu/265

Rh were five per cent, more deaths during periods of two months at a time, twice during the year. This extended back for two years, and was finally narrowed down to the service of an eminent physician who gave spirits freely in all cases of pneumonia from their entrance to the hospital. The other visiting physicians gave very little spirits, and only in the later stages. The physician was skeptical of these statistics, but finally consented to test them by giving up spirits practically in all cases of pneumonia. This was continued for a year, and the mortality went back to the average statistics. That physician has abandoned alcohol as a food and a medicine, only in very limited degree. He writes, 'My stupidity in accepting theories and statements of others, concerning spirits, which I could have tested personally, is a source of deep sorrow, and I do not know but it could be called criminal. I certainly feel that punishment would be just."

Brandy has been considered the great necessity in cholera, yet the use of it and other alcoholics are known to expose people to greater danger when this disease prevails.

The Bulletin of the A. M. T. A. is authority for the following :—

"During the epidemic of 1832, Dr. Bronson said: 'In Montreal 1,000 persons have died of cholera, only two of whom were teetotalers.' A Montreal paper said: 'Not a drunkard who has been attacked has recovered from the disease, and almost all the victims have been at least moderate drinkers.'

"In Albany, N. Y., the same year, cholera carried off 366 persons above sixteen years of age, all but four of whom belonged to the drinking classes. Packer, Prentice & Co., large furriers in Albany, employed 400 persons, none of whom used ardent spirits, and there were only two cases of cholera among them. Mr. Delevan, a contractor, said : ' I was engaged at the time in