Wood County reporter. [volume] (Grand Rapids [i.e. Wisconsin Rapids], Wis.) 1857-1923, 1873-05-08
Rum Drinking-Its Costs and Physical
Effects.

Mr.. A. p. FLAGG, of Springfield Mass,
gave temperance lecture to very large
audience at the Fifth Baptist Church last
evening and abandoning the usual strain
Of prohibition advocates, had something
readable to say upon the physical effects
and facts of liquor drinking and the liquor
trade. Eminent surgeons said they knew
the brain Of a liquor drnker as soon as
| they saw it, The blood loses its bright
red color and becomes foul When this
foul blood is driven into the brain it
gorges the vessels and very often presses
the brain against the skull, leaving the
man senseless and stupid. Finally the
| brain becomes hardened, having been
picked by alcohol, and looks very much
like t0pers nose. Sometimes the blood
vessels burst, leaving in the brain clots of
blood which causes sores, paralysis and
death. Sometimes the alcohol oOzcs
through the blood-vessels until it turns the
fatty degeneration"
1t is well known that the animal pro-
pensities lie nearest the base of the brain,
while the portions of the brain that affect
the moral and religious nature lie near the
top of the skull. When the blood is right
it reaches all parts of the brain equally,
but when it is clogged and foul it dams up
around the base of the brain, stimulating
the animal nature, while the moral and
religious faculties remain dormant Thus
intelligent men are transformed into be-
sOtcd, terocious and unreasonable brutes,
whom stupor, horror and despair drive to
the mad-hOuSe and the tomb.
The speaker introduced the following
striking statistics, showing the vast amount
OF, and rapid increase in, the production
Of intoxicating liquors:
In 1850 the total value of the liquors
prodHced in the United States was $21,-
100000. In 1857 it had increased to Sal 300
900. In 1867 about $240,0OO,OOO were pro-
duced, or more than six gallons for each
man, woman and child in the country.
The number of distilleries in the United
States in 1860 was 1 1913. In 1867 this
number was increased to 5000. There are
in the United States 100000 habitual
drunkards. The revenue from liquor alone
in the United States for the year ending
June 3, 1867, was 81, 4S3, 491 ,565; the en-
tire annual sales of the article being about
one-eighth of the aggregate products of
the cOuntry-abOut ten times the value of
all the church property in the United
States, and more than that of all our rail
roads, those of Pennsylvania only being
excepted.-Chicago Inter- Ocean.
The aggregate "lumber crop" of
Michigan reaches two thousand million
feet, valued at forty million dollars; and
if we add the lath and shingles, we reach
near fifty million dollars as the yearly
value of this great industry We find an
army of thirty five thousand stalwart men
employed in camps and mills, and paid at
least twenty-eight million dollars each
year as wages and this does not include
maChinists or saw-makers in towns and
cities, or farmers busy in their fields to
prepare food for this host of workers and
the four footed beasts that serve them
Load this yearly product into cars, and
we should have train eighteen hundred
miles long; put it on board ships, and it
would load fleet of eight thousand YES
sells; and we are told that it reached all
the lakes from Chicago to Buffalo by Wa
ter, and is carried by rail far south to In
dianapolis, Cincinnati, Pittsburgh, and
many lesser towns along the route, giving
the main income of some railroads by its
transit
THE Rock Island Union says that the
Shereefa, the present Empress of Morocco,
was formerly Miss Emily Keene a par
ticular friend and god daughter of Mr.. J.
George, of Rock Island. Miss Keene is an
English lady, and her marriage with the
Prince Wazzan, who is represented to be
man of enlightened, liberal character,
with great influence in Barbary, has at
tracted good deal Of attention.