"QUININE PORT" WINE.

King Country Chronicle, Volume IV, Issue 205, 4 November 1909, Page 5

"QUININE PORT" WINE.

In jjivint; juf!;'ircnt in tk" apainsl If. O, Wiles, cheir.ist, of Auckland, for selling lirjuor, viz. Molendo, Finest old Quinine Port Wine, without a license, Mr E. C. Cutten, S.M., said the recognised strength for a quinine wine is, according to the British Pharmacopoeia, one grain of quinine to a fluid ounce of wine. Such a wine would be unpalatable as a beverage, and would be extremely injurious to health if used as a beverage. This wine, on the other bsnd, contains only one ninth of that proportionate quantity of quinir.e, and it is palatable a 4 8 beverage. It is true it may be injurious to health if used as a beverage, bat it is obvious that nine times the quantity of it would have to be taken for the quinine to cause the same injury to the consumer as would occur in the case of a quinine wine of the official strength. "I do not think it can be accepted as a sufficient answer to a charge of selling liquor without a license for a defendant to fay that he is a chemist, and that he made the sale in the usual way of business, assuming it was to be used for medicinal purposes. A chemist, in order to obtain the benefit of section 3 of the Licensing Act as a defence to such a charge, must, in my opinion, show not only that be was a chemist at the time of the sale, but also that he had reasonable grounds for assuming that the liquor was required for medicinal purposes only. It would be sufficient, I think, if he were to prove, for example, that the Kq:ior sold in s a official or recognised mcdicineal preparation, or that it is suitable only for a medicine, and cannot be used as a beverage, or that it was supplied to a doctor's prescription, or that after due inquiry on the circumstances he was satisfied the liquor was required for medicinal purposes, and that it was supplied bona fide for medicinal purponses only. The only evdience of the kind offered in this case is that of the defendant He, while admitting that "Molendo Wine," is palatable as a beverage, says that it has some tonic qualities. That, in my opinion, is by no means sufficient. It is usually claimed that any good wine has tonic qualities and if the possession of some tonic qualities is to be a sufficient reason for chemists selling liquor without further precautions to see that it is required for medicinal purposes only, there will be little or no restraint on the sale of liquor by chemists. Defendant produced at the hearing an analysis showing that a sample of Molendo Wine analysed in Christchurch at the instance of the manufacturers contains one grain of quinine to the fluid ounce of wine. This Court, however, is concerned only with the particular liquor sold by the defendant." Defendant was convicted an! fined £5 Is.