TEMPERANCE COLUMN.

Evening Post, Volume LXXIX, Issue 118, 21 May 1910, Page 12

TEMPERANCE COLUMN.

[The matterfforr r this column is supplied by a representative of the local temperance bodies, who alone is responsible for the opinions expressed in it.l COMFORT WIPED OUT. About two months ago we made brief reference to a passage in the report of Mr. J. D. Sutton, president of the Sydney Licensed Victuallers' Association, who had lately visited New Zealand. It may be worth while to cite the passage in full :—"ln: —"In Canada and New Zealand happiness aod comfort have been wiped out. In New Zealand since No-license was introduced the tourist traffic bas fallen off 60 per cent. The tourists look to put their hand in their pocket and say, 'Give me a bottle of wine, miss.' They're out for fun, and they can't get fun where they can'fc gel liquor. They don't know where to find the sly-grog shops. They don't like- to go to the man who has a bottle in his club, and ask him for a drink." This report, having been brought under the notice of the Government of New Zealand, the Hon. T. Mackenzie ! (Minister of Agriculture, and in charge [ of the Tourist Department), replied: — i "When I noticed the irresponsible deliverance of the president of the j Licensed Victuallers' Association at Sydney, I wired to the director of the Tourist Division, asking him if there was any truth in the statement regarding the diminished tourist traffic, and a day or two ago I received a reply, to the effect that the tourist traffic from a revenue point of view shows for the year some thousands of an increase ; and with the exception of Australia, the oversea traffic all shows a considerable increase. Had it not been for the coal strike, it would have been a record year from Australia. I had arranged with the Union Company to put on their largest steamer, the Makura, to run an excursion to the West Coast Sounds, and she was fast filling up, when the trip had to be abandoned owing to the coal strike. "Regarding New Zealand's happiness, I believe I am safe in saying that the people of the Dominion were never happier, more comfortable or contented than they aro at the present time. On every hand there is abundant evidence of their prosperity and happiness." The stories of the "failure" of prohibition in the United States, circulated by agents of the liquor traffic, have oh investigation usually proved as Remote from the truth as Mr. Sutton's wild indictment. Fortunately, New Zealand being a comparatively small community, with departments that keep extensive and methodical records, exact statistics aT« generally available to the confusion of critics who resort to their imaginations for their "facts." MOTHERS AND ALCOHOL. In a recent address Dr. Saleeby has given some striking advice to mothers. Children before birth, he said, were protected in a miraculous way from many injurious influences affecting mothers, but* they were not protected from the injurious effects of alcohol, and a child might be poisoned before it saw the light. It was as bad to introduce alcohol into the maternal organism as into the child's organism, and he himself had seen children born intoxicated. Dr. Saleeby further urged breastfeeding. The mother's organic and vital relations to her child, he said, did not cease when it was born. If they did, so much tho worse for the child. For one broast-fed baby who died under twelve months old an average of from twelve to fifteen died who were not fed by their mothers. As ho did not practise medicine, he was free t to write and say anything he liked, and one of the things that he took leave to say —and the doctors did not like him to say it —was that the doctor I who prescribed stout and porter for the nursing mother Avas an ignorant man on a subject on which it was his business to be informed. Stout and porter made more milk, but if the baby got more fluid it got less food. But not only did the child thus get an excess of water and a diminished proportion of nutrive elements, it also got something which it had no business to get —and that was alcohol. If anybody asked him what he would advise nursing mothers to take instead of stout and porter ho would tell them that there were few things better for making milk than milk. INTELLECTUAL STIMULANTS. To all engaged in literary work (writes the Westminster Gazette) there comes a time when for the time being the imagination flags, ideas seem to have vanished, and all appeals to inspiration seem to be powerless. There are wellknown cases in which great writers have had recourse to artificial stimuli. Voltaire and Balzac found what they required in coffee. Gothe preferred bur- | gundy, while De Musset and Edgar Allan Poe fled to alcohol. Haschish was to Baudelaire what opium was to the j author of "The Confessions." In his early days Goethe found that indulgence in wine impeded his intellectual j work; for he had noticed that when Schiller drank more than usual the iilerary results were deplorable. The faults with which Schiller had been reproached by his critics, Goethe declared, were due to no other cause than this. The mixture of alcohol and absinthe in ivhich De Musset placed his hopes ruined his brain, and he ceasc-i to write. Poe died in delirium tremens. The genius of De Quinccy was j destroyed by opium. More innocent have been the means employed by others !to awaken inspiration. . . . What is thb common basis of all these various ways of arousing mental activity? They must give rise to sensorial stimuli which set in motion the play of cerebral phenomena. M. George Matisse suggests that these stimuli excite the secretions of certain glands. These secretions alone j would increase the dynamic power of the cerebral machine, although ho seems to b* doubtful it this explains everjthing. The one thing clear is that 'n- , tellectual effort requires in the majority ot instances a condition of nervous exaltation. That is one of the reasons why poets are not always m<m of quite amiable characters. As he remarks, Plato was quite right in crowning them with garlands and banishing them from his Republic.

A novel and ino=t inleiosling invention known as tho Porhydrometer for accuratolv controlling the weight of cavg", coals, etc., loaded on board a vessel, is being placed on tho market, sayß Kyi: Play. It is a utilisation of the laws of displacement and an extremely simple machine, 60 much so that it can be easily handled by any ono without previous instruction. The measure of weight is obtained from tho displacement caused on a. float or aerometer, which is feuspended from an ordinary weighing machine insido a large tube. This tube is placed in the centre of the ship and connected to tho soa by a small pipe and valve. No matter in what density of water the vessel is floating, the weight placed on r board will be accurately registered. Tha invention is now fitted on quite a number of vessels, and has proved itself 60 successful that firms which have had an installation completed are, it is understood, negotiating to ha%o it fitted in their other vessels. At the meeliinr of the Eller«rnoro Agricultural and Pastoral Association at Leeston the other day it wa.s stated that there wore at present 600,000 carcases of frozen mutton stored in Canterbury.