THE PROHIBITIONIST.

Wairarapa Daily Times, Volume XIII, Issue 4058, 9 March 1892, Page 2

THE PROHIBITIONIST.

FvbliMly the courtesy of the Editor of Wairarapu Daily under Hie auspices of the New Zealand Alliance for the prohibition of the liquor traffic/ Mas• terto n luxUiiry. When ratepayers demand the entire extinction of all places for the sak of lijiwro, Mrprayer should iegrantel —Charles Bxtxton, Brewer, [Communications tor this column must be addressed to "The Prohibitionist," care of Editor of Wairarapa Dam.] " How I became a teetotaller," was the subject spoken to by the Rev Mark Guy Pearae at a crowded Saturday night's meeting reoently at Melbourne, tlio Premier (Hon James Munro) in' the chair. The lecturer told the story of his conversion to total abstinence in a manner which held the vast audioncs spall-bound from start to finish. When he was a moderate drinker he used to preach and write against drunkenness, but was always attacked by his . teetotal friends for so doing, He expressed the opinion that had iris efforts in this direction met with encourage' mcnt/he would have been drawn to teetotalism many years before he was." With wondrous power he told how, step by step, he was driven from his old position by the sheer, force of conscientious conviction, until at last he signed the pledge of total abstinence. The effect of the address was such that all preßent who were abstainers felt thankful that they were, and any others who went away without having resolved to become abstainers must have had a very bad time with their consciences. The New York Voice, the official organ of the Prohibition party, says there is but one test that can be applied for membership, and that is, Do you vote on the Prohibition ticket Whoever does that has a light to membership in the Prohibition parly, whether ho be Protestant, Cutbolio, Jew, or atheist—and one has just as much right as the other, Whoever does that has a right to , membership in our party even if he drink himself drunk every Saturday night, We have 110 right to bar out 1 frprn the party any man. under the shining canopy to whom the Govern- ! ment has given a ballot, and who castß.that ballot for our party's candidates. The majority have a perfeot ; right to say who shall be the spokesi men and flag-;bearers and leaders of the party; they have no right to say ' who shall become members.

. A writer in the February number of the Janrns Miller Magazine, in a suggestive artio'e on " Baby's Inherent Bights," cites Professor Krofft-Ebing as giving this genesis of alcohol heredity; "In the first generation depravity and tendency to alcoholic excess j in the second' insanity, drink mania, and paralysis; in the third,, hypochondria and tendency to murder; and in the fourth, imbecility and extinction of family." It is an inherent right of the child that those who assume the responsibility of beooraingits parents should abstain from alcoholio inv dulgence, and thus avoid the here* ditary peril by which it is attended. Two drunks a year (says a New York qorrespondent) is the allowance for each citizen of Massachusetts, according to a bill whiok has just become law in that State, It provides that the chief officer in optqtnand. of. the police station to which'tjie person, arrested for drunkenness is conveved may release the prisoner on-the con-. Jition that the latter makes a written statement, giving his name 'and address, and 11 declaring that he has not been arrested for that offence twice before within twelve months, or that, haying been so arrested, lie has been acquitted in one of the cases." The new statute manifestly takes for granted the general honesty of a Massachusetts man when he is drunk, an opinion which, in view of the proverbial culture and erudition of the people of that State, I believe to have been grounded upon Sckiller'j maxim that" When the wine goes in the truth coujes out,"

The alarming extent of the mortality fronf influenza give special importance to & statement made by Dr James Edmunds, the senior physician of the London Temperanoo Hospital, Replying to an enquiry addressed to liira, Dr Edmunds gives the result of both the Temperance Hospital treatment and that of his own private practice. He says ! "We have had in the Londou | Temperance Hospital quite an influx of yerj serious lung cases of ai adynamic and unusual type—cases which we regard as instances of the more fatal forms of the prevailing epidemic.' In the treatment of these we h&ve entirely abstained from the prescription of alcoholics, and, considering the naturo of ibe cases, we are more than satisfied with the results ot treatment on classical lines, apart altogether from the use of alcohol, Among ray private patients I have several welLknown public men suffering from influenza wilh the dangerous lung complications, Nono of these have been treated with alcohol, and they have all recovered njqst favour; ably—one pf flip patients being Mr T,f_,' Rqsspll, M.Pj who had expriiciatiijg npuralgja in the head, in addition to seyefe febrile disease and lung complications, ond who iB now convalescing admirably. What I prescribe is absolute rest in bed, and careful nutrition at frequent intervals, especially in persons of spare Habits, who, I find, run down very rapidly, As medicine, I give a mild fever mixturo of citrate of ammonia and henbane, and, on the abatement of lever, I follow up with quinine: in the neural* gip cf fjk f otoj) the suffering with one or two 30-gram dosefl 'of quinine, and a subsequent injection of 4-5 tenths of a grain of morpliia. In the nutrition J attach much importance to carefully made beef tea and milk gruel, with barley'water, acidulated v?ith fresh lemon juice as a drink while '{ho'iebrilfj continues. I ought not to shrink from adding'thal I believe the mortality of these cases has been largely due to the craze for administering alcohol—& craze which those who aro interested in the sale of alcoholic beygrggps take every opportunity of jetim.ulating:!'—Westep