The weekly clarion. [volume] (Jackson, Miss.) 1863-1882, 1876-08-09
WOVEN AND WINE.

OF the worst foes that woman has ever
had to encounter, wine stands at the
head. The appetite for strong drink in
man has spoiled the lives Of more wo-
men-ruined more hopes for them, scat
tered more fortunes for them, brought
them more sorrow, shame and hardship
than any other evil that lives. The
country numbers tens of thousands, nay
hundreds of thousands of women, who
are widows to-day, and sit in hopeless
weeds, because their husbands have been
slain by strong drink. There are hun
dreds of thousands Of homes, scattered
all over the land, in which women live
lives of fortunes, going through. all the
changes of suffering that lie between the
extremes of fear and despair, because
those whom they love, like wine better
than they do the women they have sworn
to love. There ase women by thousands
who dread to hear at the door the step
that once thrilled them with pleasure,
for that step has learned to reel under
the influence of seductive poison. There
are women grooming with pain. while we
write these words, from bruises and bru-
talities inflicted by husbands made mad
by drink. There can be no exaggeration
in any statement made in regard to this
matter, because no human imagination
can create anything worse than the truth,
and no pen is capable of portraying the
truth. The sorrows and the horrors of a
wife with drunken husband, of mo-
ther with drunken son, are as near the
realization of hell as can be reached in
this world at least. The shame, the in
4, IL Z h.o IF Il
grace for herself and her children, the
poverty (and not unfrequently the beg
gary the fear and the fact Of violence,
the lingering, lifelong struggle and de-
spair of countless women with drunken
husbands, are enough to make all women
curse wine, and engage unitedly to OPP
pose it everywhere as the worst enemy of
their sex.
And now what do we see on a New
Years Day Women all over the city
women here and there all over the
country, where like social customs pre-
vail-setting out upon their tauies the
we'll filed decanters which, before night
shall close down, will be emptied into the
brains Of young men and old men, who
will go reelng to darker orgics, or the
homes that viii feel ashamed Qf thom.
Woman's lips will give the invitation
woman's hand will fill and present the
glass; woman's careless voice will laugh
at the effect of her mischievous draught
upon their friends; and, having done all
this, women will retire to baimy rest,
previously having reckoned the number
of those to whom she has during the day
presented a dangerous temptation, and
rejoiced over it in the degree of its mag
nitude.
Oh, woman woman! Ii it not about
time that this thing were stopped ? Are
they stronger than their neighbors who
have, one after another, dropped into the
graves of drunkards Look around you
and see the desolation that drinking has
wrought among your acquaintancess and
! then decide whether you have right to
| place temptation in any mans way, or do
ought to make a social custom respect
able which leads hundreds of thousands
| of men into bondage and death,
Woman, there are some things you
can do, and this is one; and you make
drinking unpopular and disgraceful
among the young. You can utterly dis
countenance all drinking in your o%%'n
| house; anu fOu ~. IlOIu IN susplclOH
every young man that touches the cup.
You know that no young man who drinks
can safely be trusted with the happiness
of any woman, and that he is unfit as a
man can be for woman's society. Have
it understood that every young man who
drinks is socially prescribed, Bring up
your children in regard to drinking
as not only dangerous but disgracetul.
Place temptation in no mans way. LII
men will make beasts Of themselves, let
them do it in other society than yours.
If your mercenary husbands treat their
customers from private stores kept IN
; their counting rooms, shame them into
decency by your regard for the honor Of
your home. Recognizing the living, ter
rible fact that wine has always been, anc
is to-day, the curse of your sex; that Il
steals the hearts of men away from you
that it dries up your prosperity; that II
endangers your safety; that 1t can only
bring you evil. If social custom com
pels you to present wine at your teasts
rebel against it, and make a social Gus
tom in the interest of virtue and purity
The matter is very much In your owl
! hands. The women of the country, ii
: what is called polite society, can do NOR
to make the nation temperate than al
, the legislators and tumultuous reformer
" that are struggling and laundering i
their efforts to this end,-Dr. Holland
in ScribneE's Journal,