The physician thus accomplishes a profoundly eugenic work in favouring and accelerating the production of unspoilt children. THE EFFECT OF ALCOHOL ON THE GERM-PLASM. (The New Alcohol Legislation in Norway.) (Abstract.) By Dr. Alfred Mjoën. The injurious effect of alcohol depends not only upon the amount taken, but also upon other factors, as, _e.g._, upon its dilution, and upon the kind of nourishment taken with it. There can be no doubt that alcohol under a certain percentage neither injures nor can injure either the somatic cells, or what is more important for race-hygiene, the germ cells. And, on the other hand, it must be regarded as proved that alcohol over a certain percentage is injurious to the quality of the offspring, not alone where the mother drinks (influence upon the embryo), but also where the father alone is a drinker (destruction of the germ). The latest investigations in this field confirm this assumption. There is, it is true, a middle class of beverages whose influence upon the germ-plasm (posterity) has not been established, or can be established at all. As a general rule, one may lay down the rule: _The injurious effect of an alcoholic beverage upon individuals or race increases from a certain percentage progressively with its increasing contents of alcohol._ Therefore, I propose to divide alcoholic liquors into classes, and to deal with them according to the amount of their contents of alcohol, _i.e._, according to their injuriousness. All casks, bottles, etc., coming into the market are to be furnished with the class-mark (_e.g._, I., II., III., branded upon the cord). For example, in the case of beer, the first class (under 2-1/4%), shall be obtainable everywhere. For this class there will be claimed, besides a reduction of duty, also a facility for sale and some concessions. Class I. (up to 2-1/4%) will be charged with 2 ore; Class II. (2-1/4--3-3/4%) with 8 ore; and Class III. (3-3/4--5%) with 15-16 ore per litre. Beer over 5% or 5-1/2% will be prohibited([3]). [Footnote 3: This proposal was favourably received by the Norwegian minister Knudsen, and brought before the Storthing as a Government measure. The proposal has been accepted as part of the election programme of the Radicals, the Socialist Democrats, and all total abstinence organisations.]