TEMPERANCE COLUMN.

Evening Post, Volume LXXIV, Issue 18, 20 July 1907, Page 12

TEMPERANCE COLUMN.

[The matter for this column is supplied by a lepresentative of the_ local temperance bodies, who alone is responsible for the opinions expressed in it.] TESTIMONIES FROM "THE TRADE." From La Salle, Illinois, come particulars of an extraordinary will left by Mr. G. B. Schlenk, a wealthy brewer, who recently died. Tho document states that the deceased had long been conscious of the evil caused by drink, and was desirious of remedying somo of the wrong vhich he feared had been cau&sd by hiG enterprises. It is therefore directed that his wifo and family shall have a bare competence, and his large fortune shall go to the Salvation Army, for uso in their work of reclaiming drunkards. The family intends to contest the will. Mr. Schlenk can no longer answer for himself, and it is eas yto say that he withheld his testimony during life, and that such reparation as he sought to make was not at his own cost. From Bathurst, New South Wales, however, has just come a stirring deliverancs from one, involved in the tiaflic so that he can see no present means cf escape, bitterly denounces it, and desires to aid in its suppression. Early this month, at a meeting of the Liquor Defence Association, a prominent publican deplored the lack of active interest in i,he movement by those whose intsr-ests were immediately concerned, and referred to some of the local publicans by name. An unlooked-for result was' a published reply from Mr. Richard .n.enna, licensee and proprietor of the Grand Hotel, who wrote: — "I have an interest in thrco properties, and under these circumstances it is compulsory for mo to handle the filthy' lucre accruing from the sale of detestable liquor. The public will be surprised to hoar I abhor my hotel associations. Five, years' experience convinces me that in any phase the liquor which the union ia attempting to defend is a enrso and a scourge to humanity. I could wads Ihrough a category of deplorable scepss of crime, starvation, and ruin, of which I have been an eyewitness, through this cursed liquor traffic. I have mado a deep study of tho debasing effects. Were I in the position of such multi-millionaires as are spread throughout the universe, or even possessed the wealth of some of the local magnates, my great aim in life, would be to endow institutions, libraries, and compensato licensed victuallers who come under the reduction^ or no-licence Acts. Some poet writes, 'As in body, so in mind, freaks of nature in both "we find.' This surely applies to my case, when a licensed victualler proclaims prohibition broadcast, and is eager to be interviewed by the Alliance of New South Wales to further its. no-licenss interests."

"MIXED WINE." In these days of applied chemistry, tho wine-drinker little Icnovs what compound he is,. G'wallowing. For many years i past, notwithstanding repeated revelations of tho '"Jungle" order regarding alcoholic concoctions, there remains a faith in the purity of continental "wines" which is simply pathetic. Recently, in the German Reicfe&t&y tnero have been exposures which reflect most seriously, not alone on the German, but on the French wines. It appears that a largo industry has come into existence for tho supply of the means of improperly adulterating wine. In one case it was discovered that a firm of chemical manufacturers at Stuttsjarfc sent' concoctions for doctoring wine to no fewer than 231 different firms of wholesale wifte^fllerchants'ifa'aU'pajts of Germany. Cases' liave been discovered in which from 5 to 90 per cent, of what was, called wine consisted pi -foreign ingredients, injurious, to tho^ health of the consumers. One wine merchant was proved to have purchased 34,0001b of glycerine, 12,0001b of tartaric acid, 16001b of potash, and 11001b of citric acid. The yield of grapes from the vineyards of Germany has not increased but the production of wine has been considerably augmented, of course, by these oxtensive adulterations. These German revelations have elicited the fact that precisely the samo thing is going on in France. Last yeav M. Broufse, a member of tho French Chamber of Deputies, delivered a speech in the French Parliament on the subjectof doctoring wines in France, making almost identical charges. The present disturbances in the wine-districts in France, it need scarcely bo remarked, are in great part due 'to the attempts of the State to put down tho practice of adulteration.

AN ISHMAELITE. _Mr. Crosland, who is afflicted by a kind of literary rabies and has gained a certain notoriety by his savage attacks on Scotsmen, on womankind, and other- objects of his Irrational aversions, has just chosen to run amok as the champion of Bear and Sabbath desecration. The press has long ceased to take him seriously, and this is how he is handled by the Westminster Gazette: — The frame of mind represented by the gentleman who was always "agin* the government" is one which wo all share at times, and Mr. Crosland is its prophet. His pose is rabid unconventionally, and we suspect that in his heart of hearts ho thinks himself a very fine fellow — a sort of twelfth century Crusader donning, in his own phrase, "the whole armour of altruism" to drive Hypocrisy out of Journalism. "The Beautiful Teetotaller" is, if we mistake not, Mr. Crosland's ninth crusade ; its object is to rescue Beer from the Liberal Party and to stimulate a national protest against Sunday Closing. We have no doubt that Mr. Crosland is right in maintaining that good beer is a better thing than tea, Or coffee, as it certainly is a nicer thing than cocoa ; we are quite sure that temperance hymns represent the most degraded form of literature, and we agree that some restraint should be placed on the policeman who runs in a fainting man as "drunk" ; but to th» writer who describes all ffis opponents as "baldheaded" or "nut-chewing fanatics," who attacks Mr. John Burns on tha ground that "the L.C.C. has named a sludge-boat after him," and uses tojours and au fond as English wo cannot give any serious attention. The conclusion reached from the statistics gathered by the Register-Gen eral of England (says tho Journal of Inebriety) as to the average number of deaths among 61.215 persons were, that there were two deaths among drinkors and three among liquor sellers for overy one among abstainers. ' There is hardly any other sentence that is repeated so often in the United States as "Have a drink with me," unlesn it is the remark of the other fellow to the bartender "Fill 'em up again." According to the New York Sun, New York spends a million dollars a day for drinks. The anual consumption of drinks in the United States amounts to 1,400,000 dollars. If all tho beer drunk in the United States since 1876 wore brought togcthcl it would fill a canal from New York to Denver — twenty feet wide, ten feet deep, and 1,938 miles long. The nation's drink bill (it adds is one-vhird more than the publii debt, twice as much as the capital stock in the banks, a littlo less than th*> capitalisation of thu triislb, one half the value of our domestic animals, more than one-half tho value of all our farm products, one-third moro than our total imported merchandise ,ande one-twelfth more than our total exports*