“That’s true,” said Mrs. Crowdie. “It’s what I’ve always been trying to put into words.” “All the same,” continued Griggs, “one reason why you do more than other people is that you drink water. If we are strong, it’s because the last generation and the one before it lived too well. The next generation will be ruined by the advance of science.” “The advance of science!” exclaimed Katharine. “But, Mr. Griggs--what extraordinary ideas you have!” “Have I? It’s very simple, and it’s absolutely true. We’ve had the survival of the fittest, and now we’re to have the survival of the weakest, because medical science is learning how to keep all the weaklings alive. If they were puppies, they’d all be drowned, for fear of spoiling the breed. That’s rather a brutal way of putting it, but it’s true. As for the question of drink, the races that produce the most effect on the world are those that consume the most meat and the most alcohol. I don’t suppose any one will try to deny that. Of course, the consequences of drinking last for many generations after alcohol has gone out of use. It’s pretty certain that before Mohammed’s time the national vice of the Arabs was drunkenness. So long as the effects lasted--for a good many generations--they swept everything before them. The most terrible nation is the one that has alcohol in its veins but not in its head. But when the effects wore out, the Arabs retired from the field before nations that drank--and drank hard. They had no chance.” “What a horrible view to take!” Katharine was really shocked by the man’s cool statements, and most of all by the appearance of indisputable truth which he undoubtedly gave to them. “And as for saying that drink is the principal cause of crime,” he continued, quietly finishing a piece of shad on his plate, “it’s the most arrant nonsense that ever was invented. The Hindus are total abstainers and always have been, so far as we know. The vast majority of them take no stimulant whatever, no tea, no coffee. They smoke a little. There are, I believe, about two hundred millions of them alive now, and their capacity for most kinds of wickedness is quite as great as ours. Any Indian official will tell you that. It’s pure nonsense to lay all the blame on whiskey. There would be just as many crimes committed without it, and it would be much harder to detect them, because the criminals would keep their heads better under difficulties. Crime is in human nature, like virtue--like most things, if you know how to find them.” “That’s perfectly true,” said Crowdie. “I believe every word of it. And I know that if I drank a certain amount of wine I should have a better chance of long life, but I don’t like the taste of it--couldn’t bear it when I was a boy. I like to see men get mellow and good-natured over a bottle of claret, too. All the same, there’s nothing so positively disgusting as a man who has had too much.”