The Otago Witness.

Otago Witness, Issue 2894, 1 September 1909, Page 43

The Otago Witness.

(From Oue Owk Cobeespondent.) MELBOURNE, July 28. Our Premier, Mr Murray, was in his day a victim of the drink habit, and he is accustomed still to take the platform and pose as a brand plucked from the burning and an ardent advocate of the cause of teetotajism. Mr Murray was cured many years ago by treatment in an institute, and since then he has never touched intoxicating drinks. On Monday last he went to a Rechabite meeting at

Brunswick, and delivered a rabid total abstinence address. "In advocating the cause of temperance," he said, "we are united in the closest bonds of friendship, in that we are fighting the greatest enemy civilisation has ever known. I am one of yourselves now, remember, and I want to say that we temperance people are not the ferocious monsters that the other side say we are, going about seeking whom we may devour and trying to do all the evil that we can to others. If stamping the heel on the neck of the greatest cuxse that mankind has ever known is doing evil, then I am prepared to go on doing that every day of my

life, and I am glad to be a worker in such a cause." Affirming that cigairette-smoking and dram-drinking went hand in ha..d, the Premier went on : "I should like to know how many lives King Liquor has saved in this country. On the other hand, how many wretches has King Liquor slaughtered, ruined, degraded, and sent down to an ignominious and dishonoured grave. They talk about ' vested interests ' ! Why, supposing some man had had granted to him in the past a right to keep a quagmire full of typhoid germs that was a menace to those who lived or passed near it. In

these days what would happen if the health officer came along? It would go, vested or not vested. The man we want to get on our side is the ' moderate man.' It is not the 'other side,' but the Moderate pa<rty, which holds the balance of power, and I say to the moderate man, 'Do this for us ; it means so little for you and so much for your poor helpless brother.' I began by being a moderate drinker myself, and then I went over to the wrong side. But I am on the right side now. The ranks of the drinkers are recruited from moderate men. " *' I have drunk in three continents," concluded the Premier — " lam not proud

A BRAND FROM THE BURNING. ♦ —

WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 1, 1909.

of the boast, mind you, — and found it much alike. I speak from the depths oi a long and a bitter experience. The socalled pleasures of the game aare all illusory, so much so that all the real pleasure of a lifetime can hardly compensate for one of those ' next mornings of abject misery. The misery of waking up after champagne is just the same artafter the 'sheoak juice of the back-blocks. The cause of temperance has no more whole-hearted supporter than I am.' Naturally the Temperance party is delighted at all this, but Mr Murray's friends think he is rather too inclined to don the lobe of tha penitent.