breathed air? Two things. The used-up material of the structures, returned in the venous circulation, is either burnt off, or so modified as to be converted into the most suitable forms for final expulsion from the blood. The greater part is thrown off as carbonic acid and watery vapour, while the rest, imperfectly oxidated, moves on into the general circulation, to be dealt with exhaustively in the lungs on its next transit, or to be disposed of by the liver, bowels, skin, and kidneys. This treatment of the "waste" is essential, and must be done. But the doing of it is not enough, of itself, to maintain the general temperature. And so a portion of food, digested in the stomach, and received by the blood as chyle, is specially devoted to the process of burning too; that portion consisting of such articles of diet as contain no nitrogen-oil and sugar being special examples.

In other words, within this wondrous living factory of ours, the waste material is not only burned off-as farmers do "wrack" on the surface of their fieldsthere is besides a special heating apparatus constantly at work; and so, by the twofold process, the blood is purified of its hurtful matter, while the whole frame is maintained in its due heat. Let either part of this process flag, and evil must ensue. Burn off all the blood's impurity, yet have an insufficient supply of extra fuel from the stomach-the body must grow

cold.* Send an inordinate amount of peculiarly combustible material from the stomach, so that it shall do almost all the burning-then the blood's impurity cannot be sufficiently consumed; venous blood will come to circulate more or less, instead of arterial; and the most serious consequences cannot fail to happen. The kidneys, and skin, and liver, will make great exertions, no doubt, as excretory organs—to

*It is not alleged that the whole of the heating process is done in the lungs. On the contrary, there is good reason to suppose (as will immediately be stated) that every act of nutrition and disintegration of tissue throughout the body-every change from fluid to solid and from solid to fluid-is accompanied with disengagement of caloric. But obviously while much of the "oxidation" is done in the lungs, almost all the oxygen enters by the lungs, whereby the “oxidation,” or burning, is performed.

† Irrespective of any alleged combustibility of alcohol-which recent observations have rendered more than doubtful-Prout and others have experimentally ascertained that less carbonic acid than usual is evoked during the presence of alcohol in the blood, and that such blood is decidedly darker than in persons untainted by the "poison." It would almost seem as if alcohol, circulating in the blood, suspended, to a considerable extent, for the time, the chemico-vital processes proper to the fluid in its normal state. Thus the oxidation of the phosphorus of waste tissue is sometimes so interrupted by alcohol, that the body of the drunkard smells of phosphorus, his breath presents a visible phosphorescence, and his urine is luminous in the dark. Unhappily, as will afterwards be seen, this is the only luminosity which alcohol imparts to the debauchee.

throw out the evil thus forced through the system : but they will not wholly succeed; and they themselves will suffer injury in the strain. The blood will remain impure, important organs of the body will be thrown into a state of disorder, and disease of a serious kind may be established.

But the whole of the oxygen taken in by the lungs is not thus accounted for. About a fourth passes into the system, with the blood, without being spent at all on oxidation of the "waste." This portion of the oxygen cannot well be traced in its course; but there is good reason to believe that it acts an important part in the change of the nutritious part of the arterial blood into living tissue-supplying renewal for the "waste;" and that it is again active in the crumbling down of that tissue-constituting the "waste;" in both actions evolving caloric. And so here is a third way of maintaining the general temperature.

A word as to the action of poisons. Applied to a part, poisons have various effects. Some, like potass, acids, and other caustics, destroy all structure; others, like alcohol and ammonia, irritate and inflame; others, as prussic acid, impress mainly the nerves.

The constitutional effect is also various. poison, more or less rapidly absorbed into the blood, might be circulated equably over the whole system.

The

According to a strange law, however, such diffusion does not occur; but, on the contrary, certain poisons seek out certain parts, and act on them primarily and chiefly-drawn thither by a vital, as if by a chemical attraction. Tobacco, digitalis, and the upas poison, for example, act specially upon the heart; arsenic affects the bowels, and mucous membranes in general; cantharides, the kidneys; iodine, the glands; strychnia, the spinal cord; alcohol, opium, and all narcotics, the brain.

Some kill directly and at once; others more remotely, by the induction of secondary disease.

Some exert definite effects, dose by dose; others produce their special results only after frequent and continued repetition.

Some produce continuous results; others, as the malaria, afford intervals of apparent immunity.

ALCOHOL: ITS PLACE.

"LET everything have a place, and everything be in its place." This is a good old Scottish maxim, pregnant with both thrift and wisdom. And had it but its full sway over the common household thing whose ominous name heads the page, the world were many times fairer, richer, and better, than it is this day.

But in order to put and keep anything in its proper place, we must ascertain and determine what that place is. And, accordingly, let us at once proceed to make some inquiry in this direction, so far as alcohol is concerned.

Under the term "alcohol," is included, let it be distinctly understood, every kind of intoxicating drink. All the varieties of spirits, wines, and malt liquors, are the same as to their intoxicating quality; that invariably depends upon the presence of alcohol. This may be more or less diluted, mixed, coloured, and flavoured; or, as in the case of malt liquors, combined with a