While rest is the cardinal virtue imposed on a woman during the later months of pregnancy, there are other points in her regimen that are far from unimportant in their bearing on the fate of the child. One of these is the question of the mother's use of alcohol. Undoubtedly alcohol has been a cause of much fanaticism. But the declamatory extravagance of anti-alcoholists must not blind us to the fact that the evils of alcohol are real. On the reproductive process especially, on the mammary glands, and on the child, alcohol has an arresting and degenerative influence without any compensatory advantages. It has been proved by experiments on animals and observations on the human subject that alcohol taken by the pregnant woman passes freely from the maternal circulation to the foetal circulation. Féré has further shown that, by injecting alcohol and aldehydes into hen's eggs during incubation, it is possible to cause arrest of development and malformation in the chick.[8] The woman who is bearing her child in her womb or suckling it at her breast would do well to remember that the alcohol which may be harmless to herself is little better than poison to the immature being who derives nourishment from her blood. She should confine herself to the very lightest of alcoholic beverages in very moderate amounts and would do better still to abandon these entirely and drink milk instead. She is now the sole source of the child's life and she cannot be too scrupulous in creating around it an atmosphere of purity and health. No after-influence can ever compensate for mistakes made at this time.[9] What is true of alcohol is equally true of other potent drugs and poisons, which should all be avoided so far as possible during pregnancy because of the harmful influence they may directly exert on the embryo. Hygiene is better than drugs, and care should be exercised in diet, which should by no means be excessive. It is a mistake to suppose that the pregnant woman needs considerably more food than usual, and there is much reason to believe not only that a rich meat diet tends to cause sterility but that it is also unfavorable to the development of the child in the womb.[10]