Connecticut western news., 1874-07-10
AN INEBRIATE HOME.

A Visitor at Dinner Time Tells
 What he Saw-Opposition to tho In-
 stitution-Interesting Details About
 the Unfortunates.
 An exchange teiis of @ visit paid to the Tnebriate Home on Ward Island. He says the system of conducting the Home is simple. The attendance is nearly all voluntary and is pure- 1y for the reformation of those who have fallen victims to the curse of strong drink. These find their way to the institution voluntarily, generally yielding to the prayers of their friends or relatives, who promise to support them if they will go to the Home. Some make application personally and pay their own expenses while they re- main. Still another class are committed to the workhouse on Blackwell's Island for habitual intoxication and are trans ferred at the request of, and upon pay ment by, their friends to the Home on Wards Island. There are three classes of people at the Home, or, rather, four classes, counting the servant prisoners. But this distinction of degrees is not one of punishment or of treatment, but one of money Thus the first class pay $l4 per week and are fed in man. ner equaling the board of our first class hotels. The second class pay $8 per week and are fed in very good style, equal, probably, to the usual living of the population of New York. The third | class pay $3 per week and live about as well as domestic servants do, have Q distinctive bill of fare of their own, though receiving great deal of meat which is lett from the tables above them. ......r .........,.... stl ss f. The reporter visited the various din. l ing rooms at meal time and saw for himself the process of feeding the in- mates. Thus, for dinner, which the I frst-class boarders have at six o'clock, there was on the table, first, soup, then joint of roast beef and joint of roast mutton, fricassee chicken, peas, aspar- agus, tomatoes, etc., the dinner ending liup with pie. The service and attend, ance were excellent. The second class table, at which there was only one per son present, was furnished with soup, roast beef, vegetables and dessert. The fare differs from this on different days of the week, 8 pleasant variety be- ing given. Atthe third-class table the food was not precisely poor looking, but something like that of common boarding house in the city. It consist ed of soup and beef for four days, and codfish for Friday. The servant prison CTS have about the same fare, though, of course, the same attention is not paid them, nor are they served so we'll. In the Home there are about 100 of this class of people, who are employed in all sorts of capacities from attending to the kitchen and gas house to making roads around the Island. These are the prisoners who have been sent up for drunkenness or small offences in sen- tences varying from ten days to six l months. Being naturally obliged to do I some sort of light work, they are sent here. The women not being generally of the best character in the world, 8 strict surveillance has to be kept over them to prevent them intermingling with the boarders. And this is some- what difficult, as they do all the house. work. = I There is one great point in the treat ment of the people who come here and only one great point-the entire ab. they are under no particular restraint. They can eat and drink as much tea or coffee, meat, bread, etc., as they please. I They can, in fact, do anything they please except drink any alcoholic or malt beverage. At first, the total de- privation of what they most love is irk- some, and it is said of these men that they will do anything to get little liquor, though their desire is not upon them continuously. When it comes, however, it is with terrible force, and thus it is often, found that they escape to the city in some way or another, and are generally sent back again or come back on their own accord, quite drunk.
 Dr. Hardy, the Superintendent, says that these men are all right until they get one glass of liquor in them. From that moment they seem to lose control of themselves and their actions. They don't know what they are doing. The doctor says that the most difficult thing around the place is to prevent liquor being introduced in some form or an- other. When prisoners come back they often manage surreptitiously to get some through. When he suspects this he visits them and sometimes succeeds
 in finding liquor about them. Ii any of the attendants or paid employees are caught doing this they are reported to
 the Board and instantly dismissed from
 the institution, and yet it is very hard
 to prevent the introduction of liquor in
 some way or another. Dr. Hardy, who has much experience with the subject,
 states that it is in very few and, ,excep-
 tienal cases that he finds the use of
 liquor necessary for the patients who
 go to this institution. Generally speak
 ing it is better to break straight of.
 With very few, however, they have
 got to such state that it is necessary
 to continue to administer liquor in
 sm Ill doses to bring the system up. It
 is then given in such way as to make :, it nourishment as we'll as stimulaDt.
 Thus eggs are beaten up in some brandy i or whisky so as to make an egg-nog. fSuch treatment is of short duration,
 and the necessity for it soon ceases.
 The desire for liquor continues some time, and there is temporary prostra- i,E ,Etion from the sudden disuse of it. It is nonsense, he says, to talk of the sys-
 tenn which some have recommended
 that of putting liquor in everything
 that is given to the boarders, under the idea of disgusting them with it. They
 would like it, and the more they tasted
 it the more they would get g taste for
 The appearance of these men is gen. erally very respectable, and they have
 no appearance of shame or humility at their position. In fact, they don't seem to feel it, and as they arevolun. tary inmates and not prisoners in any sense, nor under the ban of charity, there is no particular reason why they . should be humilitated. except at theil own weakness, and this certainly does not oppress them extraordinarily. The , main trouble with these men seems te be inactivity. Being generally people
 of some activity in life, and often busi ness men with family interests depend ing upon them, the silent laz:ness ot E khia 1olooa haorn khann dnun Tha1