Some leading French savants trace a direct connection between the free use of beer and the national greatness and indomitable personal courage of their opponents in the late war, and hope by the development of the brewing interest to add to the traditional virtues of Frenchmen some of those displayed in the neighboring empire. The notion may be rather fine spun, but the actual benefit of the development of a home industry in beer will be none the less, and it cannot be doubted that their end will be at least partially attained, though perhaps not in so direct a fashion as they suppose. Monsieur Lunier has just brought before the French Academy of Medicine, some very interesting statistics on the use of fermented and other liquors. According to him, wine is still the national drink. The consumption of cider is diminishing, although still large, and brandy is much used to facilitate the digestion of cider. The more cider, the more brandy. The quantity of beer used, has considerably increased in most of the Departments, and he proves conclusively that most cases of accidental death in consequence of excess, occur in the departments where there is most drinking of spirits, that apprehensions for drunkenness are five times as numerous in these Departments as in those where wine is chiefly used, that drunkenness in the beer-drinking regions is hardly known, and that alcoholic insanity is almost everywhere in proportion to the consumption of ardent spirits. The only exceptions are La Vendée and Charente Inferieure where they drink only white wines, but use them in immoderate quantities. French brewers are now engaged in forming an association and the first meeting has been announced to take place at Toulouse, in the late autumn of the present year (1879). The _Industriel de Lyon_ speaks of the matter as follows: “In consequence of their number, and as representing forty-two departments, the brewers who should support this association are most influential. They would, by means of combination, be able to properly protect their important industry, and struggle against errors of the past, such as excise regulations, octroi, etc. Besides the meetings of the Syndicate, whether held at Toulouse or Lyons, might take up general economical questions of interest to its members, and also deal with the fabrication of beer, malting, and the scientific phenomena, which are more numerous and complex than is imagined. Brewing, it is further asserted, is an industry of the future. Beer is a drink of progress on account of its refreshing and especially nutritive qualities. To produce beer cheap, appetizing to the eye, and agreeable to the stomach, is the program which the brewers of the South have in view, and which they must strive energetically to carry out if they wish to compete at all successfully with the German beers. The phylloxera is not an eternal enemy. Sooner or later science will neutralize its effects.