UNIVERSITY- HOCKEY CLUB

Otago Daily Times, Issue 14826, 6 May 1910, Page 10

UNIVERSITY- HOCKEY CLUB

The. annual meeting of tlio above club was held at tho University last evening. The President (Dr -Gilray) occupied tho chair. ...... The report showed that the club' had had a very successful year. The A. Senior team had for the fifth successive season become Hio ohampion team, and retains the M'Leah Challenge Cup. The consistency with which tho members of-the A team had .played was shown' bv the fact that each had won his blue, to do which they had to'play in 75 per ecnt. of their matches. "Reference was made to the Joss of a number of Among the First Grade the olub loses the services of Drs Johnson' and Gower, and Messrs Thomson, . Ryburn, Ilealy, and Ongley. Tho balance sheet showed the. club to be in. a sound financial condition; a balance of £3 9s lOd being carried forward. Di Gilrny congratulated the club on the satisfactory state of its ' affairs,.. more especially on tho number of 6uccessive seasons it had held' the premier position. The following officers were clected;—President, Dr Gilray; vice-presidents, last year's vice-presidents and Dr. Maloolm; club captain, Mr R. M. Rutherford, M.A.; secretary and treasurer, Mr H. Slater:' committee—Messrs Mocdy, ■ Thomas, and MJGlure; delegates to association, Messrs Rutherford and Ryburn. A hearty vote of thanks, was given to the outgoing club captain for his services.

WHAT SCIENCE TEACHES ABOUT ALCOHOL, ' TO THE' EDITOR, ' Sir—l have,perused with,some astonishment the long letter,of "H. F. B." upon the subject of the placards which the High Street School Committee—alone of all the Duuedin school, committees—refused »o hang upon the class-room walls. It may be purely a Coincidence that on; that committee there, .was a gentleman engaged in '.'the trade.". There were also others on that committee whose views- about alcohol'are' worthy of a fourteenth century schoolboy or ignorant cattle-herd. How they have, 'even with their hard-shell prejudices. managed to avoid some 6niall knowledge on the subject being driven into their heads is altogether beyond ime to explain. There was one medical man On the committee. Ho told' me that he entirely agree' 1 with what, was in. the placard, and if the: matter had been decided. by ,'liim 't •would have been accepted. I do' not . think that he was at oitlier of the meetings at' whicb the subiect was discussed, by the ■committee. .. , . . ; Now to deal with "H. jr. i).' 1 , tits. letter is , the most extraordinary hotch-potch .of distortion'and. repression that.l Jiaye seen for many a.long day. ,It is impossible not to suspect that " H F. 8.," for some purposo best known to himself, is knowingly! afcfempting. to. mislead , the people., This may seem stfong language, but ;.I: shall provo'it; Yoti.r correspondent,says.:An impartial body \like the committee o? 50 to investigate the., liquor problem «imo to the conclusion that." etc. - The very • last word that should ;be used in describing the.."committee of 50" is. "impartial." This body had no right to call itself a committeo' at all. . It was absolutely selfappointed, - and was largely composed 'of persons' bitterly antagonistic to' tbtal abstinence and prohibition. Several ol its members" we're engaged in tlie 'liquor, traffic; The main objects of the formation of the committee appeared to be the «tablishmeut of the Gothenburg system and the stopping of. the spread of'temperance education lu America. Tho committee ■ was utterly discredited at the time, and, except for .-.use. by, out-and-out liquor, supporters, no notice was,taken of its conclusions. The remainder of "H. F. B. V supposed "ecieiitific witnesses arc more 'or'less tarred with the same brush. However, I propose to show thoif'weakness. "H..]?. B." finds fault ;with ,our;placard becauw. it',says;. "The following facts are recognised by the medical . profession ! as being- ' correctly stated." Then follows the international, manifesto on alcohol, which was issued in 1903,: 6igned by many eminent'. English', American, and European professors,., and in. all, by 66+, doctors, at ihe .instance of . the British , Medical Temperance „Associajon'- This stated (1) that experiments havo demonstrated, that small quantities of alcohol are injurious, and it is not a food, ! etc*.. This was followed in 1904 by a, .petition of. 14.718 British medical noti on the saine lines, These asked the, Government through Lord Liverpool "to tpach ir-.thc pubiio schools the injurious effects of uhe most moderate indulgence in strong drink." This surely warrants us in saying that the facte in question are recognised hy tho moclical profession as being corrcctly stated. Of course, absolute unanimity is impossible. H. F. B." quotes at length the extremely unscientific generalisation in- favour of alcohol signed by' 16 medical men a.iid published in 1907, but.lie carefully suppresses the extreme smallness of the number who signed it, merely saying it was signed. by & J1 timber of the leading medical men of Greatßritain." It must also be well known 'H. F. B." that this manifesto was TO. discredited at the time. Sucii was the ridicule heaped upon it by such ominent medical men as Dr C. W. Saleeby. Dr J. J. Ridge, Sir Victor Horsley, and numerous others, that several of the 16 signatories disavowed their prccious manifesto. They "light well do so, for no fewer than 10 out of the 16 who cahie. out as champions of alcohol in .1907 had signed the 1904 petition, as quoted above, asking for teaching as "to the injurious Clteets of the most moderate indulgence in strong drink." Several of ' tho sixteen were also proved to be shareholders in breweries,: cte., and the whole affair .was . proved to have been engineered by a liquor lawyer whom it took aibou>; six months to get these sixteen signatures. The men who signed, all ex CCD:, two. were of the old-fashioned school, having received their qualifications from 24 to 49 years ago. Teaching on alcohol has totally altered since those days. Upon this precious manifesto, "H. F. B." coolly claims that the majority of medical men arc of opinion that the moderate use of alcohol is usually beneficial for adults. It is impossible x> acquii "H: F. B." of making a claim that he knew to be wholly unsubstantiated. Finally, there is your correspondent's " grea.t gun," Attwater. By extracts from Attwater's works ho claims "that alcohol takes permanent rank upon the list of aliments." Was ever, greater, rubbish penned? Who in possession of his full sensss to-day claims "that alcoholic drinks take pre-eminent rank with bread, milk, fruit, vegetables, nuts, etc.. as human aliments (foods)"? Such a claim condemns itself. But- the truth is that Attwater made no such claim. He himself disavowed it. From Dr CrotJier's "Journal of Inebriety" of . April, 1904, I take the following "The French journal Abstincur publishes an account of Dr Attwater's visit to Paris recently. M. Duclaitse and a small number of physicians, who had endorsed and defended nds theory of tho food value of

alcohol, welcomed him very warmly.- In his reply to their personal compliments ho eaid ' that the elementary _ properties' of alcohol are very circumscribed, and that alcohol, after all, was an evil aliment (food), and that it is difficult to empby it. without danger.' Later in his remarks 1,0 said: 'Wo affirm that alcohol is an aliment, but M. Duclause affirms that it is a good aliment, an oxccllent aliment, while I say it is an ovil aliment, a detestable aliment.' His French defenders wore shocked, and finally concluded that he had been forced to retract his formor statement."

Wo are not concerned as to whether alcohol can be technically described as a food or not, but we are concerned with the danger of using l it cither as a beverage ~r a medicine except under strict mcdical supervision. ■ • Gunpowder might bo technically described as a fuel, sincc it burns and gives forth heat. It is, however, in the words of Attwater, "a detestable fuel, difficult to : be employed without danger." Though the effects of alcohol on tho human ongino .are not at onco apparent as would bo tho effects of powder in a stove, yet, spread over the courso of years, those effects (even when alcohol is moderately but continuously used) are often as destructive. Alcohol is either a poison or it is not a poison. It cannot, as "H. F. B." 6ays, '' become a poison only when taken in excess." Its character does not change.' TJic effect of ono glass is tho samo in degree as the effect, of ten glasses, and the effect of one glass each day is cumulative, and hastens the processes of old age and deterioration. These are scientific /ind proved facts, and I am willing to debate them anywhere.' at any time, with any person. It only remains to be added, to liiako the case complete, that tho placard, practically as exhibited in tho schools, has been exhibited all over France by order of the Government, and' in over 100 municipalities in Britain at the expense of the city councils concerned, and signed by the health officers.—l am, etc., G. B. NICHOUS.

Sib,—Under the above heading you publish a long letter reflecting on my proposing and carrying a motion at tho recent High Street' School Committee election • directing the now committee to put up bills in the soliool making known to. the. children the deteriorating effects, of alcohol 'on . the human system, and also quoting soveral •• learned authorities in the effort to prove that'alcohol is a food and not, a ■ poison. As this very great mistake lias caused more misery to the human family than all the other agencies and mistakes put together, please allow nic to put tho other side. In reference to your correspondent's • scientific authorities, I am surprised thiit he does not know (unless it is because there are none so blind as those that will not • see) that not many years since close on . 15,000 medical and" scientific men in -,the United Kingdom signed a paper declaring that alcohol was a narcotic poison. In the face of this overwhelming evidence the distillers and brewers, who havo a great many millions invested in .making poison that is destroying their fellow creatures, had to do something, and so they got 16; learned men, who contradicted the iS,OOO, a considerable number oi whom were pecuniarily interested in breweries or distilleries. So much for the scientific evidence! But let us for a moment suppose that alcohol is a food, and let us notice' the very great difference between it' and all other ioods. It is well known that in the using of all good food tl:e desire for any • particular ' kind 'of food does not increase. The writer has been taking porridge , for the past 7U years, and he ia no fonder of it than when he began, and so say all of us,' but with alcohol the very opposite is the case, as we all know, for ive can never go into tho centre of our .city but wo will see intoxicated people more or less, who once thought, they could take jlcohol or leave it. alone, but were unexpectedly sucked into the vortex of. intemperance, so vividly described by our local poet Bracken in his poem " Gin, thou vilest iiend'of all." ~ . I do not wish unnecessarily to. take up your space, but as there may bo some of your readers, and some of the residents ir. the High Street School district in particular, who still believe, like your correspondent, that alcohol >s a food and not a wiaou, let me say thai, during the past >0 or 60 years it has been absolutely demonstrated in every possible way that alooliol s a .poison and not a food. This has been; lenionstrntcd oh the harvest field, at the 'orge, in all athletic contests, in_ all sorts if.climates, such as tropical India, where regiments on tho march that were supplied with grog had about twice as much sickness 16 those who had no grog. All the Arctic md Antarctic voyagers; know well that if they were to drink ;:lcoliol they would bo 'rozen to death. Another reason wliy.wo should not uso this food (supposing it to be a food) is that by .the using of ihis food we causc about nine-tenths of :>ur crime, about nine-tenths of our pauperism, the whole of our drunkenness ibout one-third of our lunacy, and about >ne-third of, our divorces, and a considerlble proportion of all our other miseries. Let us. then accept the Apostlo Paul s ■easoning on these premises—viz.: "It is rood neither to eat meat nor drink wine, 'ior any other thing whereby thy brother ituniblcth, or is offended or made' weak. — [ am, etc., James Stewabt.' 74 Manor place, Dunedin.