"GOOD OLD DAYS."

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume VII, Issue 1184, 29 November 1880, Page 2

"GOOD OLD DAYS."

As an evidence of the spread of temperance principles, and their' elevating influence on the and character o£ " the upper ten," the recent banquet in honour of Alderman Me Arthur's ele.vation to be Lord Mayor of London may be cited, as affording an illustration of 'the change for the better that has come oversocial customs. Even in our own day a public •b'anqiK# s :.T* ; as' cpnsidered impossible withoutfrom at least a third to about half, the gentlemen being' '• knocked over,'! as it was. termed whenmanliness' lay'aill of a heap " under the" mahogany " 'or on i the door mat Those, were the so-called "good old days,!' whetl national, aentimont foimdits expression in^BUoh songs as . ." Won't jo till morning,'^" Down 'among the dead: men," (meaning the empty and broken'; | bottles) and other boisterous babblings;* I about flowing bowls "and" ruby streams. Indeed the passport of a " baiiiellpw well met " was the number of corks he could draw,, and generally, the "parson", when he came to ,be 7 tqaated, , w^as^ appreciated just* hi proportion as he^had kept^pStiß with tha^uzasling- of his parishionors, and . had^thereby, v by his ex : ample applied their consciences with a salve plaster for'- any oy^rst^pßing pi the ; boundary of which they might have been guilty. At that unmoral period, too, anything-Kke a true 1 religknr^sjirtjr ment^usually turned evejry. hea.rer into a parson's clerk, arid ' derisive v ameh J s" ' would go round the board. • Bui: tfoitigV have -altered since then. :Qur recent 'Lord Mayor's banquet was. a notable illustration of the progress of the better principles of social- life. The chief disgrace to that gathering would undoubtedly have been the presence of any one person who had forgotten that gentleman do not get drunk. There ■ was also another incident ... during the evening;, especially worthy of notice. It was a remark made by the vice-chairman, ' when he proposed "the ladies." He said if circumstances had permitted, the' firm who had given the banquet would have been glad to have seen as many ladies present as there were gentlemen ; and this expression .elicited the wannest, applause of the company. Siirely.the' sight of a public banquet with laSies and gentlemen as gue3ts would be weß" nigh sufficient to startle our rubicunjJL ancestors dutl-of tlieir ' tombs. But/asl we have said beforej, things have altered-* and the world is progressing in this matter: We hope to see : the day when a banquet can be popular even witlidut the wine cup..