The Mason County journal. [volume] (Shelton, W.T.) 1886-1927, 1890-01-03
ABSINTHE DRINKING.
Origin of the Vice in France and its wide
Prevalence.

ORION of the Vice in France and it's wide
Prevalence.
There seems to be no doubt that alb
sinthe as a cordial was largely made by
the old French confiseurs, who were eX-
perts in the science of distillation; but
it was only when used as flavor to
other beverages, and does not seem to
have become common potation until
about the beginning of the reign OF
Louis Philippe. The balance of evil
dence. so far as it is Obtainable, would
seem to show that the Algerian cam
paign, in the days when the Princes OF
the Orleans family were fighting so
bravelv in North Africa, and when the
favorite song of the French troops was
"La Casouette du Pere Bugeaud," had a
great deal to do with the popularization
of absinthe among military men. The
operations of war had to be carried out
not only under burning sun, but in all
seasons, at all hours, and very often on
marshy ground. The men were exposed
to continual fatigue, and nothing is
more probable than that some skillful
and kindly military surgeon, observing
the ravages made by brandy on the
health of the troops in such climate
as that of Algeria, prescribed as slim
ulant diluted absinthe. The soldiers
may have made wry faces at first at a
beverage which, to the uninitiated, tastes
very like doctors stuff" but with dis
astrous celebrity they soon grew to like
it and to drink it in excess.
From a camp tonic dispensed to re-
cruit exhausted strength, and which in
the beginning may have been as benefi-
cent as the eucalyptus cordial served out
to the laborers in the Roman Campagna,
absinthe became the favOrite pick-me-
up in tie Algerian cafes. 1t soon re-
crossed the Mediterranean, left its traces
at Marseilles and ToulOn, and with ter
rible quickness became domiciled in
Paris. 1t seized, so to speak, upon the
people just as gin did on the London
populace early in the eighteenth CEN
fury. and has never since released its
dreadful grip. We had positively to
pass an act of Parliament in George II. s
time to diminish the number of gin
shops, and to restrict the consumption
of the poison by placing largely in
creased excise duties upon it. Our
neighbors have not yet seen fit to pass
any law tending to suppress, or even to
restrict, the sale of absinthe. The del
eterious stuff has absolutely been allow
ed to adulterate the French language.
Modern dictionaries have not scrupled
to admit the verb ''absinther," to Sab
sinthiate," and ''s'absinther," which is
to swill or gorge ones self with alb
sinthe; then an absinthe drunkard is
called an ''absirtheur'' and there is
even an aphorism current in the brasse-
ries: eff thou hesitatest, absinthiate
myself" Poetry, finally, has been
pressed into the darkly fascinating SER
vice of this malefcent herb. Absinthe
has been called, from it's half-verdant,
half opalescent hue, the FAIRY with
the Green Eyes" Infinitely baleful,
pernicious, fatal has that green-eyed
fairy been to tens of thousands of
Frenchmen, gentle and simple, lettered
and unlettered; nor among the victims
of the seductive poison should be for
gotten one of the greatest poets of mod
ern France, Alfred de Musset.-
Telegraph.