“METE” TOPERS

Evening Star, Issue 18698, 29 July 1924, Page 6

“METE” TOPERS

A PUBLIC DANGER. Down the yca,rs of existence there comes a time to most women when it is felt with the lotus eaters that “all things are taken from us, and become portions and parcels of the dreadful past,” when life brings us up against a blank wall, and nothing seems worth the living (says a writer in the ‘Age’). You may have escaped it. You may have so ordered your life that you merely belong to that ineffectual army of negative goodness which accepts all things in placid peace, walks gingerly by, and knows nothing beyond the dullness of monotony—if so, you will not he able to enter into the horror and the hopelessness of men and women who are gradually sinking to some nameless, unknown abyss through the medium of such a simple household commodity as methylated spirit, or a spirit that anyone can procure, and enough of which can bo obtained for a shilling to make any woman a raving lunatic. It is no use holding one’s hands up in holy horror and condemning with loud lamentations those who are addicted to taking this spirit. To resort to such a potion a woman must have reached the limit of her powers of resistance. Her environment has become too much for her, and in her desperation she turns to anything that will make her forget. A wealthy woman will find drugs, alcohol, and other means by which she may dull the pain of meeting one hopeless day after another. A woman, perhaps, not wealthy, but still well to do, may resort to the same means to begin with; but the narrower limits in which she must necessarily live and have her being will not admit much indulgence without detection, and she will in time turn to other means in her battle against the eagle eyes of her family. It is not uncommon m such cases to discover can de Cologne is used to ease the craving unrest that seems to mrk in every corner and shadow every footstep. When the poor revolt in mind and soul against the drabness of distress of their surroundings they, too, may at first find a little peace with ordinary alcoholic beverages; but they can never afford sufficient to dull their senses to utter forgetfulness until they realise that a little methylated spirit—cheap, unsuspected, and easily procured—will be even more effective. Once this fact is realised by women who are thoroughly up against things, it is only a question, again, of time until they, too, have lost all sense of proportion and gradually become slaves to the habit. Among the poor it means untold misery. 'Tho spirit is so cheap that it onlytakes a few shillings to make men and women absolutely mad, and, as they generally have someone depending on them, one can hardly conceive the terrible conditions under which many children are living in Melbourne at the present time, while the lives of women are simply being thrown away because of the ease with which methylated spirit can be procured. Hardly a week passes but some case appears in the Police Court, while evidence of the habit is given again and again _in connection with people who apparently die from an unknown cause. The drinking of methylated spirit is not confined to Australia. It has been recognised in several other countries, and steps taken to check such a danger to the community. As sold by grocers and chemists it is fairly unpalatable, but the taste can easily be improved, while the spirit exuberates and stupefies tho individual. In view of the fact that methylated spirit is so necessary for domestic purposes, seemed impossible to restrict the sale until it was found that without deducting any useful properties, or lessening the commercial value, the spirit could be made an emetic, and so undrinkable in great quantities. The habit became bo prevalent that it was necessary in the interests of the public to compel the manufacturers to make the spirit practically in> possible as a beverage.