"GARGLE" IN GERALDINE

NZ Truth, Issue 244, 26 February 1910, Page 6

"GARGLE" IN GERALDINE

Gets James Joseph Down. Aud His Wife Doesn't Want Him. From .time to time the no-license town of "Geraitline furnishes illustrations of' the failure of" Prohibition to prohibit. The beer . and whisky merchants of Christchurch and Timaru do a big thing m ardent liquors with the parched Ashburton electorate, and when a moderate sosseller gets his joy juice m bulk he sometimes becomes an immoderate sosselier, and his 'domestic arrangements rush about the premises like a game of football m a lunatic asylum. ' James Joseph McQuinlan is a hardworking person, who earned nine bob a day and planled virtuous hool-prints on the sands of rectitude, until . no-license j compelled him to har ter his self-respect for ' beer that was probably imported m fear. and trembling. He swore to love, honor, and obey Mary, his missus, on April 1 9,1 907; but he afterwards became 1 so wet inwardly, despite the dryness ol Geraldine, that Molly was compelled last Week to apply to Magistrate Day ,'^fo.r a separation- order. When m beer James was most violenfi, and his language was hot enough to he used as fuel tp boil the family kettle ; if some inventor contrive to bottle it up for that purpose. Also, he 1 threatened to "do" for Mary, and as the lady has a natural disinclination to figure as a mangled corpse, she desired to . place daylight between herself and thie boozy one. When the first child was borh, hubby celebrated thc occasion with -whisky and violence, to the danger i of' the missus and the unhappy baby, which, appalled at the prospect of an existence under such alarming circumstances, handed m its earthly bib and : tucker and joined the Cbenibim. Jim must have been a man of good intentions j because he hurried home to the missus j when he got his pay and handed it all ! over to her ; but shikkur is expensive, j and he bullied her until she returned the j coin, when booze, biff, and blanky was the subsequent programme. If it hadn't j been for the cash she received from her.j parents, Mary would have starved. She j sought mother's place on November 15 1 last, and didn't want to go back any ; more. ■ His Worship made an order that the ! two. be . no 'wager compelled ijo cohabit, and McQuialan was ordered to. pay 15s per week towards the support of his wife, and 5s for each child born ,; of .the, unpleasant union.