The Evening Star. PUBLISHED DAILY AT FOUR P.M. Resurrexi. FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 10, 1882.

Thames Star, Volume XII, Issue 4325, 10 November 1882, Page 2

The Evening Star. PUBLISHED DAILY AT FOUR P.M. Resurrexi. FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 10, 1882.

Mb McGowan and the revd.^ gentlemen on the Hospital Committee are to be commended for the stand they have taken in connection with the use of intoxicants in that institution. Wedonotkuow which to blame most, ■ the cook who had the impudence to request that the Committee should supply him with beer for his dinner, or the committee that acceded thereto. If the cook thought he was underpaid, why did he not ask for an increase of wages? Or if he was dyspeptic and could not eat his dinner without a tonic, the doctor was the proper person to apply to and not the Committee. But what shall we say of a body of persons, representatives of the subscribers, a large proportion of whom are either total abstainers or opposed to the habitual use of stimulants, voting beer for a man who presumably is in good health, out of their funds ? As to whether certain quantities of drink are allowed in the army, or any where else, does not matter a pin's point, for there is no parallel. There the men are provided for like horses or oxen; in the hospital, if the situation does not suit a man, he is not bound to retain it. And if he does his work satisfactorily, he is quite welcome to wash down his dinner with beer, which may be, and probably is, an excellent tonic, but hot for long, we trust, at the expense of those who object to beer in any form or for any purpose. Herein lies the difference in principle. Having received their money, or, in other words, his wages are partly paid by subscriptions from these people for doing certain work —clearly he is entitled to spend it in beer or anything else, because it is then absolutely his property. Certainly he has a perfect right to purchase beer out of his own earnings. But he does wrong to ask, and Committee does wrong to give, in a direct way money for that which cannot by any mode of reasoning be construed into an essential for the institution, which might be done very well without, which might actually prove harmful to the individual, and deter persons from subscribing, because such a course would be flying in the face of a certain section of the community. The action of the Committee means paying part of the cook's wages in beer, a most objectionable course to pursue in a, public institution. Another matter is, whether in the treatment of patients more stimulants are used than to common-sense people appears necessary. Iv touching on such a subject there is always danger of the layman poaching on the preserves of the professional man or specialist. We are firmly convinced that alcohol is almost a necessity at times with the doctor—it will effect what nothing else could do, at least under particular circumstances. Perhaps every one might be better for abstaining from all class of intoxicants when in good health,

at all events those who do avoid them alto gether generally enjoy quite as good health as their neighbors. But those very properties in alcohol which are so dangerous, and frequently hurtful, if it be taken habitually, may be of all things the most useful when the system is low. Dr Payne is of opinion that brandy ia the .sheet anchor of the physician, and We agree with him. Still there is a disposition to overrate its value, to regard it as a cure-all, amongst some persons— especially those of the old.school. Experience has often shown that those who had no stimulants progressed better than th<sse who took them. It may be that their use even in sickness might in many cases prove baneful rather than beneficial. Not a few ideas with regard to the usefulness of alcohol have been exploded by the experiments of recent ye >rs. It has been clearly demonstrated that, whether in the Arctic regions or under the tropical sun, the teetotaller holds his own against the man who likes his grog.