TEMPERANCE COLUMN.

Evening Post, Volume LXXIX, Issue 83, 9 April 1910, Page 12

TEMPERANCE COLUMN.

[The matter for thi3 column is supplied by a representative of tbo local temperance bodies, who alone is responsible for the opinions expressed in it.l NATIVE RACES AND ALCOHOL. At the Twelfth International Congiess on Alcoholism, recently held in London, Hcrr Victor, of Bremen, in a paper on "Native Races and Alcohol," taid a great change had come over the attitude of the German Government. Formerly that Government had incomprehensibly refused to acknowledge the injury done to natives by spirits. Last year, however, Germany took the lead in the Brussels Conference, proposing to raise still further the duty on spirits in Wei=t Africa ; but the proposal failed owing to tho opposition of France, Spain and Portugal. Sir Robert Llewelyn, of the Colonial Office, corrected a statement that the British Government wa6 issuing invitations to a fresh conference on the subject. It was not prepared to take euch a step until the Commission. 6ent to West Africa had reported. Dr. Harford said that the Magna Charta of this movement was to bo found in the late Lord Salisbury's declaration that tho native races in question were for all practical purposes children, and that, so far as we could do it, they must bo protected. Lord Milner, in promulgating an ordinance which provided a penalty of six months' imprisonment for a first offence against the law prohibiting the sale of liquor to natives in the Transvaal and Orange River Colony, had described the- traffic as "one of the most degraded agencies for making money by the corruption of one's fellow-creatures. ' "SAMLAG" SYSTEM. • At the international Congress 'on Alcoholism a paper was read by Mr. Lair. 0. Jensen, of Bergen, on the "samlag" or company xystem in Norway, which, he believed, helped to prevent the worst form of drunkenness. An animated dit>cussion followed. Dr. J. Bergman (Stockholm) opposed the Gothenburg or any similar system of dealing with (the liquor traffic. He was opposed equally to the liquor monopolies of Switzerland or Russia, and objected strongly to tho proposal to substitute the desire for gain from an individual to a municipality. The tendency of the Gothenburg system was to .make prohibition impossible. His own opinion was thai Ijhe revenue from intoxicants in Sca.ndinavia should not go to tho public exchequer, but betpent solely on methods for. undoing the evils of the liquor traffic,! in which circumstances the Gothenburg or any other system would nolt be a substitute for prohibition, but only a btep towards it. The idea of applying the Gothenburg system as it is to other countries he thought to be wrong. Dr. Helemius Sappala (Helsingfors), in a stiong speech against "management," referred to the strength and influence of the spirit merchant* and brewers who sold their products to the companies in Scandinavia. How was it, he asked, that these men .said nothing against the Gothenburg system ? In supporting the companies they were, therefore, eupporting the enemies of prohibition. .finally, he asked whether they ought to compromise with a moral evil? After some further debate Professor Jensen replied. He still maintained that the FamLag system had done something to reduce drunkenness, but also declared that wherever they could get rid of fcaralags they would' do so. THE DOLL IX THE BAR. A bartender in a down-town saloon was wiping glatses one Saturday night (says the Denver Post), when two youi:g men came in and ordered drinks. He served them, and they made an effort to be sociable. "Take a little booze yourself," one said. "No, thanks !" replied the bartender. "Don't you u>e it?" he was"" asked. "Not any more. I used to get outside of barrels of it, but I never touch it now." "What brought about the reformation ?" The man in the apron turned and pointed to the back bar. "See that?" he said. The two young men saw a little china doll propped up among the glasses. "What do you keep that up there for?" asked one. "It belonged to a four-year-old girl once," t-aid the bartender in a low tone. He pauhc-d a moment, then" he added, "Old John Barleycorn and 1 starved her to death. That's ju&t a reminder." He went back to wiping glasses, and the two young men moved away silently. "MADE~IN " Mr. Constable, K.C., Unionist candidate for Blackfriars, Glasgow, wats addressing a meeting in Rentou, and endeavoured to illustrate how the foreigner is taking work from the British working man. He ufed an illustration which he thought would appeal to his audience. "Take a bottle of whisky," he said, "the bottle i» made in Bohemia, the label is printed in Germany, the cork comes from Kpain, the tin-foil top from the United States, and" — here a stentorian voice intervened — "and the^whi&ky from hell!" The reht ot the argument was lost in a storm of applause. Even the most pronounced Freetrader would scarcely object to v prohibitive tariff upon imports fiom such a quarter. LADY'S DOWNFALL. A shocking story of the depth to which drink can drag a person of education and position came to light in the Slouch Police Court yesterday (reports Ilia London Daily Telegraph of 18th January), when a clergyman's wife stood ill the dock charged with stealing a bottle of champagne from a Slough wine shop. The prisoner's name is Mabel Vosper Thomas, and she is the divorced wife of a curate. She is only twentynine years of age. Lady Henry Somerset and the Earl of Lytton have taken an interest in her, in the hope of reforming her, and letters from them were handecf to the magistrates. Prisoner had previously been charged with housebreaking in Bedfordshire, and she was bound over for three years, of which two were to be spent in a home. She was taken to Lady Henry Somerset's home at Doxhurst, Reigate, and was an inmate of the hospital there, but she got through a window, and absconded. The chairman said it was not, perhaps, too late to hope for her reformation. The only question was how thai, reformation could be brought about?. The Bench understood that there was a warrant for her apprehension on nnother charge, and they preferred to leave it to others to deal with her on that charge, as it might bo thought desirable to give her a longer t.nm of imprisonment than they could havo given her upon tho charge before them. Prisoner is the mother of a little boy, end she said she had not seen her child for three years.

Mahomed Fahniy, leader of the Young Egypt Party, indignantly denier (through The Times'c- Geneva correspondent) that the murderer of Boutroß Pasha hah had any connection with tho Young Egypt Party.