The Republican. [volume] (Oakland, Md.) 1877-current, 1884-03-08
FEMALE INEBRIATES.

FEMALE INEbk1AIES.
The now common custom of resorting
to the use of spirits in times of pleasure,
as well as for the relief of pain and de-
spondency, is fraught with dangers but
little appreciated by the average indi-
vidual. That the custom of the free use
of stmulants is upon the increase
amongst women, especially in our lar
ger cities, is easily demonstrated. A
cursory visit to any popular restaurant
will result in the visitors seeing ladies
both alone, in parties, and with and
without escorts, who ten years ago
would not have tasted an alcoholic bev-
erage of any kind. even in their own
homes, taking beer, wine or spirits
with their meals, almost as matter of
course, and apparently with no idea
that they are doing anything unlady-
like or unusual.
Beer, and especially bottled beer, has
of late years become immensely popular
with all classes. Ladies stop at restau-
rants often with the sole purpose of hay
inc bottle of beer to refresh and in
vigorate them after long walk, or
when tired from shopping; families take
it regularly by the box; boarders have
it privately at table or in their rooms;
and servants, pitcher or pail in hand, no
longer make q secret of their trips to
the corner groggery or the avenue beer
saloon. Grocers keep it, and sell it to
families by the bottle or box. The same
sentiment that has made the German
! style of open-air concert so popular in
! this country seems at the same time to
have brought with it love for convivi-
ality, and to have popularized the Gus
tom of beer-drinking.
| Beer has been the entering wedge,
and following close upon it has come
! the more or less free use of spirits
And this was natural and to be expect
ed. One thing almost unconsciously
leads to another in matters of this kind,
and beer has proved itself stepping
stone to the use of strong liquors
Women who formerly would have used
spirits only under medical advice, and
even then reluctantly, now resort to
them without objection and upon the
slightest grounds, simply because their
previous use of beer seems to have
broken the ice. To many a poor
wreck, the first glass of beer has
proven costly experiment. and will be
looked back to as the first step in a
career the incidents of which make her
shudder.
1t has been urged by some that the
Germans, than whom there is not a
more Woodworking, frugal and studi-
Gus people, are nation of beer-drink-
ers, and that the introduction of their
amusements, social customs and the
like, would prove not only not mis-
fortune, but a positive boon to Ameri-
cans. The fact, however, that for
many reasons Americans differ from
Germans in point of nervous organiza-
ton, or rather lack of nervous equili-
bration, if we may be permitted to use
the term, makes that which would
prove of signal benefit to the latter ex-
tremeIy dangerous for the former.
That American women are placing
themselves in position of peculiar
danger by admitting beer, and later
wine and spirits, to their homes and
tables, as well as indulging in them
while away from home. is fact beyond
question. The peculiar satisfaction with
which tired. exhausted or unstrung
nervous system receives the stimulation
thus derivable leads almost invariably
to further resort to it. The fact that
; woman's bodily or mental condition
is such that the slightest effort causes
exhaustion and calls for stimulation be-
speaks, as forcibly as nature can posi-
bly, express it. a very unhealthy, not to
say dangerous, state of affairs, for
,, which a physician should be consulted
without delay. In such conditions the
chances are in favor of the woman's be-
coming, after time, wholly dependent
upon alcoholics. We have known such
= women to become in time the veriest
; sots through this same originally oc-
casional resort to stimulants. Others
of the same class are known to us to-
day who are fast travelling the danger
Gus incline. To some the consequences
+, of the course they are pursuing are evil
J dent; but the craving which has become
! firmly established seems to be too great
g for their unaided powers of resistance.
2 They cry, wiring their hands in agony,
aud bemoan their cruel fate in their in
' tervals OF sobriety, make rash promises
e to their husbands, and fondly caress
). their little children that alcohol
o is fast robbing of a mothers love and
a care, and whom she is daily robbing oil
4 their birthright of good name and
responsibility. How many poor
T wretch of this class curses the first swal-
: low that ever passed her lips! Confne-
f ment and close surveillance in some o.
t these cases seem to do good for time,
+ but the old craving appears never to be
b thoroughly crushed out, for it keeps
r cropping up every little while, some
n times in its old fury, sometimes modi-
8 fed. Not few of these unfortunates
take to opium, or chloral, or both, and
G while using them manage TO abstain
: from liquor. They arei content to dc
this, and their friends, hopeless of 6
radical cure, are willing to allow then
G the narcotics, on the ground that though
/, one form of inebriety is virtually rs bad
as the other, still that from the habitua
/ use OF narcotics is less painful to the
n view, and not nearly so prone to result
in open disgrace as that from alcohol
Some, however, after acquiring GRAY
@ ing for narcotics, relapse into the ole
:; habit Of drunkenness from alcoholics
d and then their state becomes desperate
V and disgraceful in the extreme. Be