A CURE FOR DRUNKENNESS.

Lyttelton Times, Volume LXXV, Issue 9431, 4 June 1891, Page 2

A CURE FOR DRUNKENNESS.

TEMPERANCE ORATORS AND PROHIBITIONISTS NO LONGER NEEDED. {New York Sun.) Good Dews finds always willing ears and ready credence, but when a sanguine public is told that a judicious use of the hypodermic syringe for three weeks will banish completely the demon of intemperance from the land, it need not be won* dered at if there is a little hesitation about accepting the glad tidings. But this is the millennium-hastening proclamation which cornea to us from the West, and cornea backed by such interesting evidence that it demands our unrestricted attention. So convincing is the testimony in support of the value of the discovery that the’ Chicago Tribune was moved the other day to demand that the new' method of dealipg with the appetite for narcotics be introduced inthe~ public ins titutions of Chicago. No more than iocalattention seems to have been attracted to the experiments. which have been made during the past ten years by Dr Leslie Keeley at Dwight, 111., until a record of 5000 cases had been made, and then it was announced that only five per bent of these had relapsed intbihtemperahce. Now the hard drinkers ofthe West are beginning to talk about it and the doctors are investigating, for there seems to be no secret about the remedies used.. 81-CHLORIDE bi> GOLD ROB DRUNKENNESS.

Dr Keeley was an army surgeon during the war, and ho' has bean since the head surgeon in the employ of the Chicago and Alton Railroad. He has beeaerperimehting for eleven years in the'treatment of the disease intemperance—for be it known he believes that dealing with the evil comes almost solely within the province of the physician and not in that of the exhorter or moralist. He sought for a remedy which would kill the gorm&of an unnatural appetite for , narcotics. Early in his researches he became convinced that bichloride of gold furnished the weapon for which he was in search, bat it was a long time before he discovered the best combination or vehicle with which to use it. Bichloride of gold has been for some years, a favourite agent, in the hands of bacteriologists, and some remarkable results have been obtained with it in a variety of ways It is only recently Dr Keeley says, ‘ tjbat he has learned to Use it in the mbfct effective way. He administers ' the remedy both subcutaneously and through the stomach. ALL THE WHISKEY THEY WANT. Dwight, Illinois, is an interesting little village where hd liquor can be ’ : obtained except at Dr Keeley's institute.' Anybody who goes there for treatment can get aU the good whiskey he wants from the Doctor’s liberal demijohn, but, strangely enough, he never calls for any after being under treatment for three or four days. Dr Keeley's institution is not a hospital or sanatorium. Victims of alcohol, opium, or other narcotics, who go there, find their own quarters in the village for the three weeks they are under treatment. They ore expected to report at the institute four times doily to be inoculated, and they must take a dose of the chloride of gold remedy internally every two hours. Otherwise they occupy themselves as they please. The inebriates are pretty sure to apply to the Doctor for liberal rations of whiskey the first day or two, and they get as much as they crave. "It's good whiskey, coo, the Doctor supplies/' said a former patient whom a Sun reporter happened to meet the other day, “thehest lever drank. Bat I didn't want any after the third day. Z didn't gain any abhorrence of liquor c I simply didn't crave it or feel the need of it. Better still, without any reaction or suffering from the abstinence, I began to regain a sense of manliness and independence, which had been lacking for months. The courage and strength whioh came back made me feel like a new man. Thera were thirty-five patients there when I was, and I know they all felt the same effects." EASY TO CUBE At STEADY DRINKER. It is an interesting paradox, so it is said-at Dr Keeley's institution, that the worse a man is the easier is he cured. In other words, it is easier to cure an habitual drunkard than a man who goes on periodical sprees. The first individual, in medical • parlance, is afflicted with alcoholism, and the second with dipsomania. Dr Keeley admits that if a dipsomaniac is treated with chloride of gold during an interval of sobriety the craving may return at the accustomed time, when it will he necessary to repeat the treatment in order thoroughly. to eradicate the appetite. The Doctor’s description, of the dipsomaniac's case as distinguished from that of the ordinary drunkard is interesting. He says: “We find that a man remains sober, steady, upright, and industrious for a year or more, when, suddenly, he commences to drink, and, after a debauch of several days,. and sometimes, weeks, he stops and remains sober for another year or more. If you follow that man on through the years, you will notice that the intervals between his sprees become shorter every year, until he falls into the everyday use of stimulants, and sinks into the grave a sodden, beastful drunkard. Some men have a spree every two weeks, and the periods vary in different cases from weeks to years. The dipsomaniac is always aware of an impending attack of the disease. It does not strike him suddenly; it gives him full and fair warning of the danger ahead. For two or three days previous he will be languid, restless, troubled ' with loss , of appetite, and an intense uneasiness pervading every movement. Then follows the terrible debauch, ending in ■ sickness, misery, shame, remorse, and a loathing of alcohol in all its forme." lOWA'S SOCIETY OF EX-DRUNKARDS.

A great many of Dr Keeley'a patients have come from the prohibition state of lowa. If the evidence adduced goes for anything, it shows that, the evil of intemperance exists in lowa in far worse form than in any so-called free-liquor State in the Union. At all events, - those who first tried the internal,: gold plying sent so many others that Dr Keeley established a*branch institute in the State. This reoently . led -to, one of the most extraordinary gatherings at Des Moines ever chronicled. It was no less than a drunkards’* or rather ex-drunkards ? , reunion and banquet, at which the Mayor and other prominent citizens were entertained as guests. About a hundred gentlemen from all parts of the State organized the ‘ lowa Eeeloy League, and arranged to hold yearly reunions to celebrate their ’release from the of narcotics in various forms. ' The reunion was held last month, and the Des Moines Capital printed a long report of what was said and done their. The speech of the President, Editor Eoberfc Harris of the Missouri ‘Valley Times, contained some interesting comments upon the temperance problem, which will hardly he relished by prohibitionists or total abstinence exhorters. He said; ’ «The city in which I live is not a very bad city in the drinking line—just an average prohibition city; but, since I made my pilgrimage ■to Dwight, I have' sent thirty-two of the boys to that place or to Des Moines to be cured, and I am proud to any this'evening that they are all 1 sticking ■ to the faith, and are to-day ae eober men as can be found in lowa. " ‘

" l am not egotistical—that'is, not more so than the' average run of newspaper men—bub I believe that my cure has done more good to the temperance cause in the city in which I live, and in Western lowa, than all the temperance lectures ever delivered there. .1 was known as a drinking man, and now I am known as one of the Keeley patients, one who was thoroughly cured; and hundreds of my friends have gone and done likewise. Although I do not wear the blue or red ribbon, I believe I have been a temperance worker, and I J m willing to back my work against the longhaired howler for prohibition, and I have no fear for the result when the returns are

all in and the’back townships havobeen counted.

"What I most want to nr.y is thattha state should take this treatment! n hand. The state provides a home for the blind, a home for the insane, where the poos, unfortunates may be cured, a home (or the. feeble minded, a home for the decrepit old veteran, and why should the State not provide an institution for the core of the. unfortunates who have been mastered by the desire for liquor ? The liquor habitue is afflicted with a disease worse than insanity. He has a chance foe his life In the Keeley cure, and why should not the State famish the institute P If the Stateowned the institution for theoure of drunkards there would bono neecUof prohibition laws, for when a man has gone through the Keeley treatment he ceases baying liquor, and if all drinkers will quit buying the saloons will soon close up without the interference of law. Then the prohibitlofl millennium will have arrived, J. Ellen Foster and the W. C. T. U. can put on. their little crowns and join the gang on the other shore, for their work will have been finished and they oango.ovor and claim their reward."

There were other, speeches by men-who, had had no desire for liquor since sab-’ mitting to Dr Keeley's inooulatioMuwme of: them several years before j aha then this oddest of all temperance meetings oamotoan end.

One fact cited in proof of the vahusof the new discovery may oahee some. kltght apprehension on the part of the travelling , public, but it is interesting. Itls said that the Chicago and North-WesteimEailxoad is offering passes to Dwight to such of their employees as need and that 1 men who haye been blacklisted on. account 1 of intemperance are taken back on certificate of treatment by the now remedy. AN ANTIDOTE TOR THE OPIUM CUES*. Even more interesting than the effect of the treatment on drunkards is what the new remedy does for the slaves of opium. It is well understood by most people that the victim of the opium habit is a tar mors hopeless case than is the immoderate drinker. Dr Keeley has recently published a book , upon the use of opium, whioh contains some startling statements regarding the extent of the abuse ofthe drug in this country. He argues hot bnly that the practice ofmedicihehaa changed Wonderfully during recent years, but that diseases have changed, that-is, that-ths human frame suffers nowadays from a different olaas of diseases than formerly.