One of the best examples of affection of the offspring by diseased conditions of the parents produced by a toxic agent which directly or indirectly affects all the cells of the body is afforded by alcohol when used in excess.

Since drunkenness has become a medical rather than a moral question, a great deal of reliable data has accumulated in regard to it as a factor in the heredity of disease.

Grotjahn gives the following examples: Six families were investigated in which there were thirty-one children.

In all these families the father and grandfather on the father's side were chronic alcoholics, and in certain of the families drunkenness prevailed in the more remote ancestors.

The following was the fate of the children: eight died shortly after birth of general weakness, seven died of convulsions in the first month, three were malformed, three were idiotic, three were feeble-minded, three were dwarfs, three were epileptics, two were normal.