ADULTERATION OF SPIRITS.

Evening Star, Issue 3818, 20 May 1875, Page 3

ADULTERATION OF SPIRITS.

To the Editor.

Sib,— lt is unfortunate when a self-consti-tuted authority makes a bold unfounded public statement, that there are always unthinking dupes ready to re-echo it, till by oft repetition it attains in the minds of the bulk of the community the position of an established fact. The matter of the bad quality of the liquor said to be sold here is one of those unfounded statements which is continually cropping up and has been made a deal of by Dr Bakeweli in his letter in last Thursday’s Stab. I think it may be fairly assumed that Dr Bakeweli and others who write in the same strain are but meagrely-informed on the subject. If it were said that spirits when consumed in the quantities indulgedinbya considerable portion of thepeopleof Dunedin, produced, in some instances, “ delirium tremens at'd insanity,” most people would assent to the sehf-apparent fact. But when it is. stated that thtf cases of delirium tremens occurring here are caused, not so much from the quantity of spirits consumed as from the bad quality of the spirits, I unhesitatingly affirm such a statement to be contrary to fact. Although a friend to the temperance cause, I am not now writing for or against it; but simply in the interests of truth. I, however, wish to say, en passant, that this bad quality argument, by raising a false issue, injures the cau e of temperance. There are not better spirits imported into any part of the British dominions than into New Zealand. Taking brandy as a representative •pint, I assume that that which comes from the most respectable and well-known producers wm generally be found to be the best. In the frontrank of producers, then, stand Kartell and Hennessey, of Cognac, whose spirits command the highest price. Now, those who know the New Zealand import trade, know well that for every thirty-one gallons imported., thirty ?,1 * a f e the two mentioned brands. The bulk of all kinds of spirits consumed here are imported by first-class houses, their London correspondents arranging with the continental producers for an aggregate quantity for the year, to be shipped at stated intervals These spirits, as a rule, are never landed in England, but transhipped from the foreign vessel direct into the ship sailing to the Colony the spirits being all the time until the ship sails under the surveillance of the Customs autho nties. Of coarse it is possible some publicans may adulterate their liquors ,• but it would be a libel to say that adulteration of liquors is £?rnea en more in Dunedin than elsewhere, ■rutting aside the generally respectable class of men .engaged in the retail liquor trade here, reason itself is against the idea of large adulteration being practised, for there is no other part of the world where people can afford to Biy a better price for a good article than in unedm. But alcohol is not ambrosia, and if people would but bear this iu mind we would hear less of the exaggerated cry of adulteration. —I am, kc., -r. , _ , ITOQUHAET MACPHERSOxV. Donediu, May 14.