NATIVE RACES AND DRINK.

White Ribbon, Volume 22, Issue 258, 18 December 1916, Page 7

NATIVE RACES AND DRINK.

Striking testimony as to the evil eflpe t of drink upon the subject races in South Africa, the Gold Coast, British Columbia, and Ceylon, was givei at the recent annual meeting of the Native Races and the Liquor Traffic United Committee. The Bishop ot Willesden who presided, referred to the terrible effect of smuggled spirits upon the Indians of British Columbia, where he spent eighteen years. Miss Theodora Williams, who has worked for many years in the Transvaal, said the evil of the illicit sale of liquor to natives of the Rand was of enormous extent. Rev. Stephen J. Gibson, of the Gold Coast, spoke of the deplorable results of spirit trading in that land. He felt aghast, he said, at the ravages of alcohol. Mr i). B. Jayatlaka appealed for support for the Temperance party in Ceylon, or. whom trouble has fallen owing to recent riots, with which they had no connection whatever. The whole of the Buddhist Temperance leaders had been imprisoned under martial law, without charge, without trial, and without opportunity to prove their innocence. One result of the Government action was that the Temperance organisation, in which 50,000 male heads of households had been enrolled, was falling to pieces, and another was that toddy rents were rising—in one area they had sold for more than last year—the vendors believing they would sell more liquor now that the Temperance movement was checked.