THE PROHIBITIONIST.

Wairarapa Daily Times, Issue 3920, 23 September 1891, Page 2

THE PROHIBITIONIST.

mithei by the courtesy of the Editor of

tJFairarapa Daily under the auspices of the New Zealand Alliance for the prohibition of tlie liquor traffic, Masterton Auxiliary.

When ratepayers demand fhs entire ex~ tinction of all places for the sale of Hquorsiheir prayer should be granted. — diaries Buxton, Brewer. . [Communications tor this column must be addressed to "The Prohibitionist, are of Editor of Wairakapa Daili.]

The Scandinavians in Mauriceville wisely voted prohibition in the recent election, very much to the disgust of a local "whisky ring" of Bomewhat small dimensions. The members of this "ring'' are patriots—and so was the Yankee who was willing to shed every drop of bis brother's blood for his country's good! The members of this "ring" are seriously concerned about the comfort of the travelling public and are anxious to see Mauriceville make material progress by leaps and bounds. The members of this "ring" believe that the sale of whisky would mean the economic salvation of Mauriceville and so (hey have handsomely subscribed the needed gold and have engaged lawyers to upset the Prohibition vote of the Scandinavians. We are not impressed with the reality or sincerity of the patriotism of this buah whisky ring. The "travelling public" plea is a cock that won't fight in the antiProhibition battle.- The publican party in Masterton let the cat out of the bag in the recent election contest. The Prohibitionists were labouring to turn the Masterton public houses into accommodation houses pure and simple; but the publican party said this meant" ruin " —the drinking bar was the mainstay of the business. If the whisky ring in Mauriceville are seriously concerned about the comfort of the travelling public, they can do as the boarding house keepers are doling—run a public house without the drink. The second plea for the setting up of a public house in Mauriceville, that it would further the material advancement of the place, is simply a huge falsehood. A lunatic student in a political economy examination once said that the people of Shetland made a comfortable living by washing each others clothes ! The lunatic was just as wise as the Mauriceville patriots who ask the Scandinavians to spend their money in whisky swilling. Will the people be better in health through the proposed swallowing of alcohol and fusil oil ? Verily no ! A public house in Mauriceville will simply mean the setting up of a nursery for paupers, bankrupts, and crhrinals. The H in. John Ballance declared the other month that it would be a " glornus thing " if the liquor revenue were blotted out of existence. Mr Ballance knew that the drink traffic was our national disgrace - the measure of our material degradation. We sincerely trust that the Mauriceville people will not be led astray by a " whisky ring." I hey are really being summoned by the publican party to

" Drink and be mad, this is our earnest wish ; Gloriously drunk—obay thq Important call; Our cause demands the assistance of your throats ; Ye all can swallow, and we ask no more. Let the Scandinavians mete out to this whisky ring the punishment it richly deserves in the event of a fresh 1 election.

The history of the Scandinavians is of interest to the Temperance Reformer. Away back in the heathen times of this race drunkenness was looked upon with loathing. The old Book of Proverbs of the heathen Swedes—the " Woln Spa," terms this vice " the Hisgrace of man and the mother of wiser v." In the fifteenth century spirits became known in Scandinavia and drunkenness spread with fearful rapidity. The great kings, Gustavus Vasa, " and Gustavus Adolphus, checked the evil by prohibition. Auother great king and warrior, Charles the Twelfth, who as Johnson in his noble poem "The vanity of Human Wishes " says: "Left the name at which the world grew pale, To point a moral, ar adorn a tale," was an outand-out total abstainer who drank nothing but milk and water. But as years rolled on the drink scourge increased among the hardy Norse. It was urged even early in this century that no restriction should be placed on spirits as distillation was considered necessary for the proprietory ot agriculture. The trade inspirits obtained, and what was the result ? Let the writer of a paper read before the Glasgow Philosophical Society give the answer:—"ln Sweden the effect was fearful—national drunkenness beyond the excess of all other nations. The whole country may be said to have been deluged with spirits; the physical aspect of the people wretchedly deteriorated, and a criminal calendar, said to be without parallel in modern history," King Charles John in 1835 awoke to the real danger of the situ» ation. At his expense total abstenance literature was circulated in every part of the kingdom. The people soon saw the situation as the King saw it. They clamoured for prohibitive measures. A special Commitee of Diet in its report of 1857 says:—»A cry has burst forth from the hearts of the people appealing to all who have influence—a prayer for deliverance from a scourge which previous legislation has planted and nourished." The result has been restrictive legislation which has changed the most intemperate raoe in Europe into a comparatively sober people. The Scandinavians for historic reasons of the most potent character try to crush the drink curse in its infancy in the land of their adoption for they know it to be their oldest, deadliest, and most persistont foe.