On the other hand, we know that although alcohol may technically be considered as a food, it is a very unsatisfactory food and, as the following statements show, it has an effect on the body tissues which foods do not have. Professor Chittenden of Yale College, in discussing the food problem of alcohol, writes as follows: "It is true that alcohol in moderate quantities may serve as a food, _i.e._ it can be oxidized with the liberation of heat. It may to some extent take the place of fat and carbohydrates, but it is not a perfect substitute for them, and for this reason alcohol has an action that cannot be ignored. It reduces liver oxidation. It therefore presents a dangerous side wholly wanting in carbohydrates and fat. The latter are simply burned up to carbonic acid and water or are transformed to glycogen and fat, but alcohol, although more easily oxidized, is at all times liable to obstruct, in a measure at least, the oxidative processes of the liver and probably of other tissues also, thereby throwing into the circulation bodies, such as uric acid, which are harmful to health, a fact which at once tends to draw a distinct line of demarcation between alcohol and the two non-nitrogenous foods, fat and carbohydrates. Another matter must be emphasized, and it is that the form in which alcohol is taken is of importance. Port wine, for instance, has more influence on the amount of uric acid secreted than an equivalent amount of alcohol has in some other form. To conclude: as an adjunct to the ordinary daily diet of the healthy man alcohol cannot be considered as playing the part of a true non-nitrogenous food."--Quoted in _American Journal of Inebriety_, Winter, 1906. Effect of Alcohol on Living Matter.--If we examine raw white of egg, we find a protein which closely resembles protoplasm in its chemical composition; it is called albumen. Add to a little albumen in a test tube some 95 per cent alcohol and notice what happens. As soon as the alcohol touches the albumen the latter coagulates and becomes hard like boiled white of egg. Shake the alcohol with the albumen and the entire mass soon becomes a solid. This is because the alcohol draws the water out of the albumen. It has been shown that albumen is somewhat like protoplasm in structure and chemical composition. Strong alcohol acts in a similar manner on living matter when it is absorbed by the living body cells. It draws water from them and hardens them. It has a chemical and physical action upon living matter. Alcohol a Poison.--But alcohol is also in certain quantities a poison. _A commonly accepted definition of a poison is that it is any substance which, when taken into the body, tends to cause serious detriment to health, or the death of the organism._ That alcohol may do this is well known by scientists.