How Improper Diet is Depopulate Rural France.

Southland Times, Issue 19048, 16 May 1903, Page 2 (Supplement)

How Improper Diet is Depopulate Rural France.

As in America and England, according to Cloudesley Brereton, an English scientist, the attractions of town Ufa and higher waj;es are among the more obvious causes of the depopulation of the rural districts of Franco. But there are other causes which have been giving tho statesman and the philosopher something to think profoundly about. The low birthrate la partly duo to the hijh sUndaru of personal comfort, and partly also to the system of inheritance. Mi', Hreretori (juotes the witty Frenchman who said that'the English system of primogeniture confines the number of fools t& one per family, but the French have discovered a most effectual w«y of rendering tho whole family imbecile. But Mr. Brereton also casts a sad light on the present condition qf what was once the most temperate country in Europe, if not in the world. The phylloxera was even a more terrible curse to France than was imagined when a Pasteur endeavoured to stay its ravages.. It made a good wine dear. The poor were driven to bcct-root-spiiit, absinthe and other hoiiois for their st.imultmt. Weare toUl that a workman's breakfast consists of slices of bread floating in spirit. Even children are brought up on this "soup." The inevitable results are alroady showing themselves. The number of recruits unfit for servicj jn the northern depart merits has increased sixfold j in, gomo cantons the recruiting of conscripts is practically impassible. Sixty per cent, of the males and 70 per cent, of the females in the lunatic asylum at Alencon are alcohoiicst