New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1872-01-01
put these sporadic Yankees TO work tea hing
the rest the clemens Of recent American
FOR HOSPITABLE WOUET.


One or two plain facts for our lady-readers
in lieu of bon bOns "a a New-Icars Offering.
Two thirds of the inmates of our jails and
penitentaries, according to actual statistics,
are sent there by the use of liquor lt - III
bad taste, we will be told, perhaps, to drag
these unfortunate wrctches into their view III
bright happy homes on this genial holiday
time; they do not belong to good society
and are outside of its ken and reach In what
are called the upper classes, champagne anu
sherry do not lead a man to burglary or mrr
der What they do lead him to our gentle
and fashionable friends know az well "a we
| There il not Zone Of them VINO does not
number on her visiting list to-day some one
of the host of ruined old men, or gay, gener-
Gus young fellows who are going down the
same steady steep decline; whose faces grow
more bloated day by day; the frank eyes
dnler the CHEEKY laugh imbecie; the brave
soul so lately full of the wholesome, hearty
resolves, more desperate and weak in its strug-
gle against the death that drags it inexorably
down.
New-Years-any anniversary for these mon
"a for us ALL is a sort of milestone where they
are apt to glance forward and back on their
lfes journey, aud, if over, resolve to change
its direction. Nine out Of ten of the men who
drink, we venture to say determine to turn
cover a new leaf" to begin with the new
year - for although drunkenness may be jest
TO the belle of the ball, It is no jest to any
man who has felt even the first touch of it3
force and threat of decay. 1t is to these men,
struggling to regain their chance for life
through pain often such az the damned might
feel in struggling to escape from hell, tha
women. good hearted mothers and innocent
girls, will offer liquor on Newfear's Day--urg
il OH them with all the allurements that beauty
and cordial hospitality can add. Not only to
these men, but to young lads, to many Of whom.
from physical reasons stmuant IA actual
poison, they will present it in way almost i'm
noss,ble to resist. Yet these women, in all
pr,bability, suffer in their own bodies tho
inherited curse of this evil Wherever there
ia insanity, epilepsy, nervous diseases, weak
spincs, trail constitutions, there will be found
in four cases out of five moderate drmker
one or two generations back, the fountain
head of physical poison. Thee women in
their turn will be mothers, if they are not
now, and may watch their own sons go out
into the world at the outset of life TO be
seduced by other Christian women to the road
which will end that life soonest and IN the
deepest degradation.
1t is the habit of certain silly class Of
women, who ape whatever il fashionable, 20
call this plain statement of facts fanaticism
Good society has slipped its wines for genera
tons, they tell us. But the fact begins to be
understood by Others than scientific men, that
owing to climatic and other reasons, liquor. IN
its most inn0cuous form, cannot bc used with
impunty by Americans IA by other nations !;
that for most of our dyspeptic nervous gen
Grafton abstinence, and that absolute, is the
only safeguard. Owing partly TO the recOg-
milton of this truth, in the best houses here
and in Washington, no liquor was offered on
last New Years Day; probably, too. the more
refined women of our society were willing 20
believe that they were able TO offer to their
friends higher hospitality than the means Of
making themselves brutes. We hope that
their example will be followed by other classes
who, if they cannot inaugurate change OF
custom, have usually quckness TO adopt it.