degeneration of the blood, follows, as a matter of course, since, on the
one hand, we have an agent that _retains waste_ matter by lowering the
nutritive and excretory functions, and on the other, a _direct poisoner_
of the vesicles of the vital stream."

Dr. Henry Monroe says: "There is no kind of tissue, whether healthy or
morbid, that may not undergo fatty degeneration; and there is no organic
disease so troublesome to the medical man, or so difficult of cure. If,
by the aid of the microscope, we examine a very fine section of muscle
taken from a person in good health, we find the muscles firm, elastic
and of a bright red color, made up of parallel fibres, with beautiful
crossings or striae; but, if we similarly examine the muscle of a man
who leads an idle, sedentary life, and indulges in intoxicating drinks,
we detect, at once, a pale, flabby, inelastic, oily appearance.
Alcoholic narcotization appears to produce this peculiar conditions of
the tissues _more than any other agent with which we are acquainted._
'Three-quarters of the chronic illness which the medical man has to
treat,' says Dr. Chambers, 'are occasioned by this disease.' The eminent
French analytical chemist, Lecanu, found as much as one hundred and
seventeen parts of fat in one thousand parts of a drunkard's blood, the
highest estimate of the quantity in health being eight and one-quarter
parts, while the ordinary quantity is not more than two or three parts,
so that the blood of the drunkard contains forty times in excess of the
ordinary quantity."

Dr. Hammond, who has written, in partial defense of alcohol as
containing a food power, says: "When I say that it, of all other causes,
_is most prolific_ in exciting derangements of the brain, the spinal
cord and the nerves, I make a statement which my own experience shows
to be correct."