Professor Edward [sic] Parkes on a spirit ration / [Lauder Brunton].

  • Lauder Brunton
Date:
[1915]
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: Professor Edward [sic] Parkes on a spirit ration / [Lauder Brunton]. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    5 / Revrinted from The Lancet, March 6, 1915 PROFESSOR EDWARD PARKES ON A SPIRIT RATION, To the Editor of The Lancet. Sir,-1-!!! a discussion on the issue of a rum ration to our soldiers I have been expecting to see some reference made to the most important scientific experiments on this subject in the Ashanti Cam¬ paign in 1874, which were made by Edward Parkes, F.R.S., to whom the British army is enormously indebted for the improvements he effected in its hygiene. The results of these experiments were published in The Lancet in August, 1874, and reprinted with introduction and appendices in a small pamphlet entitled “ On the Issue of a Spirit Ration during the Ashanti Cam¬ paign of 1874 ” (London: Churchill, 1875). This report is so valuable that one would like to reprint it in its entirety. This being impossible I would like to quote some of his conclusions verbatim. “ It (alcohol) is not a perfectly reliable aid, and requires, when used at all, to be so with a full knowledge of its mode of action (p. viii.). The first effect of alcohol, when given in a moderate dose (for example, what is equal to one fluid ounce of absolute alcohol) is reviving, but this effect is transient. As shown both in the Report and in the first Appendix, the reviving effect goes off after, at the utmost, two and a half miles of additional march, and sometimes much before this ; then the previous languor and sense of exhaustion not only return, but are sometimes more intense, and if alcohol is again resorted to its effects now are less satisfactory. Its reviving power is usually not so marked, and its peculiar anaesthetic and narcotising influence can only be distinctly traced. The men feel heavy, dull, disinclined to march, and are less willing and cheerful. It /