The Republican. [volume] (Oakland, Md.) 1877-current, 1884-01-12

and q mother and her baby-four gen.
erations together they are all
dirty, and disheveled, and drunk, ex-
cept the baby, and even the poor little
mite may have its first taste of alcohol
pre- emily. 1t is no uncommon sight in
these places to see Il mother wet
baby's lips with gin and water. The
process is called "giving the young'un
a taste" and the baby's fati er will
look on sometimes and enjoy tie joke
immensely.
But the time to see the result of
Saturday nights heavy drinking in
low neighborhood is after tho houses
are closed. Then you meet dozens of
poor wretches reeling home to their
miserable dens, some of them rolling
across the roadway and falling cutting
themselves till the blood flows Every
penny in some instances has gone in
drink.
One dilapidated ragged wretch met
last Saturday night was gnawing q
baked potato. BY his side stood a
thinly-clad woman bearing baby in
her arms, and in hideous language she
reproached him for his selfishneSs. She
had fetched him out of pubDc-house
with his last halfpenny in his pocket.
With that halfpenny he had bought the
potato, which he refused to share with
her. At every corner the police are
ordering or coaXing men and women to
''move on" Between twelve and one
it is a long procession of drunken men
and women, and the most drunken seem
to be those whose outward appearance
betokens the most abiect poverty
Turn out Of the main thoroughfare
and into the dimly-lighted back streets
and you come upon scene after scene to
the grim, grotesque horror of which
only the pencil of Dore could do just
ice. Women with hideous distorted
faces are rolling from side to side Shrek
ing aloud snatches of popular songs
plentifully interlarded with the vilest
expressions. Men as drink as them
selves meet them, there is a short inter-
change of ribald iests and foul oaths,
than quarrel and n shower of blows.
Down from one dark court rings cry
of murder, and woman, her face hid
eously gashed, makes across the narrow
road pursued by bowling mailman.
1t is only drunken husband having o
row with his wife.
A friend of mine, who is never tired
of trying to urge the people of this dis
trict to temperance, not long since
found a man sitting up naked on heap
of rags shivering with the death throes
on him, and crying for water for his
parched throat. His wife, in maudlin
state of intoxication, was staring help
lessly at her dying husband. A coat
was given to wrap round the poor fell
low. AT night, when my friend re-
turned, he found the man cold and
dead and naked, and the woman in q
state of mad intoxication. She had
torn the coat from the body of the dy-
ing man and pawned it for drink. In
these districts men and women who are
starving will get grants of bread, and
some of them ask for the bread to be
wrapped in clean paper Do you know
why? That they may sell the loaf to
some one for a copper or two, and get
drunk with the money. Men will come
and buy pair Of boots in the morning
out of their earnings, and pay seven
shillings for them. At night they will
return to the same shop and'offer to sell
them back for four shillings. They
have started drinking, and want the
money to finish the carouse with.--G.
Il. Sims, IN London Daily NetOS.