He was given an experimental dose of 50 c.c. of alcohol, and in ten minutes became excited, tried to get out of bed, attacked other patients without reason, and was able to speak neither spontaneously nor in response to questions. In a period of two hours he became clear and asked what the trouble was. He knew only that he had taken alcohol.
_Re_ the experimental excitement produced in Kastan’s case by the exhibition of alcohol, it is of note that Bérard has been much impressed by the agitation that surgical cases of alcoholism undergo when anesthetized. It may be that the anesthetics act similarly to the experimental alcoholism of Kastan’s case. According to Bérard, these phenomena of the anesthetized wounded (who are men recently evacuated from the front and other hospital cases) are of larval alcoholism brought out by the anesthesia. Bérard wonders whether rum issues at the front are at all responsible therefor.
Gottlieb S. left the barracks, January 25, 1915, met friends and drank with them, remaining all night in the railway restaurant and waiting room. He was promptly arrested.
According to the patient, he had always drunk a good deal and had once fallen from his horse in the campaign, and become unconscious. After this fall, he said he had been able to stand less alcohol than before.
There is doubt as to the syphilis of Gottlieb. He said he had been infected once, but his further statement that he had six relapses is, of course, questionable. As to the hypothesis of feeblemindedness, it appears that in childhood he had learned badly and had been a stammerer. He had been a herdsman, and after that a laborer. He finally became a travelling man for a specialty photographer.
He had previously been convicted of an embezzlement, brawling, and breach of the peace.
As to his military crime, he said he had been celebrating the emperor’s birthday the last three days, being urged on by acquaintances and drinking whiskey. He was, in fact, on a spree and did not eat properly. He had met a student in the railway station and had forgotten all about his military service. He remembered having spoken with the waiter, remembered telling the student that he was going to commit suicide, and the student had drunk seltzer with him. January 29, he for some reason drank no more, and then it occurred to him that he ought to go back to duty. He remembered that he was easily led astray. He had once thought of becoming a tanner but had been dissuaded from the trade because of its bad smell.