The Republican. [volume] (Oakland, Md.) 1877-current, 1883-09-08
Temperance Reading.
THE MILL AND THE STILL.

diet Is bread, so important and album
dant an article of commerce is grain,
and so naturally is one associated with
the other, that we scarcely ever give
the subject of cereals as source of
liquor the consideration it deserves. To
the average individual corn and grain
mean food, and chiefly bread; and to
assert to such one that grain is as
great a curse as it is blessing is almost
invariably to call forth both surprise
and indignation.
And yet it is true. Corn, typical of
all grain, according to its subsequent
treatment, according to the process to
which it is subjected, comes forth, from
mill or still, a blessing or curse-bread
or liquor. Both children of common
mother, the Cain and Abel of post
cereal life, they differ as essentially in
every characteristic as do two human
beings; the one bringing health,
strength and happiness to even the
humblest homes, the staple food of all
nations, the basis of all nourishment;
the other, save in very rare instances
and under peculiar circumstances, an
unmitigated curse, bearing disease, dis
honor and even death into thousands of
homes, blasting fair young lives, blunt
ing every good attribute of mind and
soul, prostituting honor, honesty and
integrity, deadening conscience, incit-
ing to crime, leading to rags, squalor
and starvation, manning the gallows.
peopling the poor-house, crowding the
courts and filling the prisons.
To it may be justly ascribed nine
tenths of all crime, suicide, poverty and
prostitution; from its deadly seed
spring idiocy and insanity. Through
its agency family ties are sundered
promising lives engulfed in debt and
dishonor, friends and secrets ruthlessly
betrayed, hopes and ambitions blasted,
and Gods masterpiece of creation
man himself-made u bloated wreck.
In no sense food. alcohol will Meth
er impart nourishment nor sustain life;
but, on the contrary, its use invites,
causes and complexities disease, both
organic and functional, poisons the
blood and tissues, weakens the muscles,
disorders the nervous system, and de-
stroyes the mind and faculties.
How marked the contrast between
the two! the one in every sense life-giv-
ing, happiness-bestowing, body-nour-
ishing; the other essentially destroyer
of all these, whose footsteps are invari-
ably accompanied by misery, despair
and dishonor. Yet the difference is but
step-smply one of degree. The
| Toured grain, mOistened and kneaded,
leavened with touch of yeast, COM
mences to ferment. The starch of the
flour, through the agency of the yeast,
breaks down into alcohol and carbonic
acid gas, the latter penetrating every
parG Of the loaf. and making it light
and spongy. Then comes the heat Of
the oven just at the proper moment
killing the yeast germs, putting a sud.
den stop to all fermentation, and giving
us the brown and fragrant loaves o.
| bread.
Huge tanks and watts in which thou
sands of bushels of grain are soaking
The same leavening of the mass, the
same fermentation and breaking dowr
of the starch into carbonic acid and al
cohol, but so treated and favored tina
the latter is yielded in the largest posi-
bic amount. No restraining hand o
| heat to limit the process at the poin
where food ends and liquor begins, bu
every endeavor made to obtain the lat
ter. Then the gaping nav of the still
and the serpentine coil pouring forth
its steady stream of liquor, mans worst
enemy. Liquor is simply one step be
yond bread in the same chemical pro
cess, yet how widely, terribly diferen
in their effects upon man!
i was made to be eaten, and not to be drank
To be husked in barn, not soaked in a tank
i come as blessing when put in mill;
As blight and Il curse when run through
| still.
Make me up into loaves, and your children
| are fed;
But into Il drink I will starve then instead
In bread I'm servant the eater shall rule
In drink I'm master, the drinkqAa fool.
| Then remember my warning-IM strength
| I'll employ,
If eaten to strengthen, if drank to destroy
The subject under discussion is very
wide one. Not only must we consider
the evil that liquor does, but the waste
of all the million bushels of good grail
that would otherwise be made into fooC
that it takes to feed the stills and pro
duce the alcohol, or the thousands o
acres of fertile land devoted to its cult
walton that might be far better used il
raising other foods if the demand fol-
alcohol Oiquor) did not exist. To how
many destitute men and women anC
cherries homes would their prod;ct:
yield plenty and happiness!
Economically, we must consider thu
millions of wasted lives, the impover
ished, beggared and starving families
the resulting crime, and the army o
paupers, lunatics and criminals, tn,
heavy taxation that is required to sup
port the prisons, hospitals, lunatic asy
lums and aims houses, as well as the
fact that the wages and the results o
the industry of all these inebriates are
lost to us, and that, were they steady
SOBER industrious men. would be add.
ing to general trade and prosperity
The sum thus lost and thus expended il
restraining and providing for these in
divduals is enormous, aggregating bill
ions yearly.
Who that has looked out over tn,
acres of ripening grain, the stacks o
golden corn, the sheeted white of tn,
barley fields; who that has watched tn,
sturdy harvesters, the lusty, healthy
reapers shearing Mother Earth of hel
bounteous crops; who that has joined
in the festivities of q ''husking bee
can for q moment hesitate as to which
is the proper destination of the grain
| - IL I