nts of that fluid, and thereby diminishes its
reception and distribution of oxygen. We are thus enabled to see
clearly how the alcohol diminishes the oxygenation and
decarbonization of the blood, and retards all tissue changes
both of nutrition and waste without itself undergoing oxidation
with evolution of heat. Consequently, instead of acting as a
shield or conservator of the tissues by simply combining with
the oxygen, the alcohol directly impairs the properties and
functions of the most highly vitalized elements of the blood
itself, and thereby not only retards tissue waste but also
equally retards the highest grades of nutrition, and favors only
sclerotic, fatty and molecular degenerations, as we see
everywhere resulting from its continued use. Can an agent
displaying such properties and effects be called a _food_,
either direct or indirect, without a total disregard for the
proper meaning of words?"

In another place he says:--

"This lessening of the elimination of tissue waste is simply an
evidence of the accumulation of poisonous substances within the
body, through the lessened activity of liver and kidneys and the
impairment of the blood."

Dr. Ezra M. Hunt says in _Alcohol as Food and as Medicine_, page 37:--

"It sounds conservative of health to say of a substance that it
delays the breaking down of tissue, but the physiologist does
not allow a substance which occasions such delay, to possess,
because of that, either dietetic or remedial value. To increase
weight by prolonged constipation is not a physiological
process."

Dalton says:--

"The importance of tissue change to the maintenance of life is
readily shown by the injurious effects which follow upon its
disturbance. If the discharge of the excrementitious substances
be in any way impeded or suspended, these substances accumulate
either in the blood or tissues, or both. In consequence of this
retention and accumulation they become poisonous, and rapidly
produce a derangement of the vital functions. Their influence is
principally exerted upon the nervous system, through which they
produce most frequent irritability, disturbance of the special
senses, delirium, insensibility, coma, and finally, death."

The power to retard the passage of waste matter from the system is one
of the gravest objections to the us