Iron County register. [volume] (Ironton, Iron County, Mo.) 1867-1965, 1894-01-04

occasion for it. The law had been sue
cessfully invoked, and the liquor traffic
was at very low ebb. There was
practically nothing to crusade but the
single saloon that was conforming to
the law. just after the holidays an
attempt was made by local talent to sci
the crusade afioat, but the attempt was
not a success.
/ Crusading was the fashion, however.
All the neighboring towns had crusad-
| ing bands, and it was felt by those who
had charge of the morals of the CON-
| munity that crusade was essential to
| Its moral health. So, DR.. Lewis was
procured to deliver couple of lectures
at a very stiff figure; Van Pelt was Sc
cured for less money, and the process
sion was headed toward L.
Although twenty years have flown
by, I distinctly recollect that uncom-
Portable night in February. The larg-
est hall in the town was packed with
an audience comprising it's best men
and women-all in a state Of suppress
ed excitement-all anxious to hear DIR.
Lewis and his new coadjutor, Van Pelt.
l remember very particularly the part
les occupying the stage. There was
DR.. Dio Lewis, a man of fine physical
81 ho
had the faculty of making his enthusi-
asm produce very cheering financial
results. There was Van Pelt, coarse,
strong, black-eyed, black-haired man.
whose low and retreating forehead in
formed you that you were not in the
presence of a John b. Cough, and
whose language gave you the impress
sion that he was not on the best of
terms with the Kings English. With
these parties were merchants, physi-
clans, reporters. ministers of the gospel;
the mayor of the town, on the anxious
seat for reelection; attorneys; prohi-
bitionists, skeptical as to the methods
then being introduced, but willing to
try anything that gave hope of helping
on their beloved reform; the enth usiast
who believed the millennium was at
hand; and last, but not least, that in
dispensable adjunct to every temper
ance movement, the reformed drukard.
In the audience was very considerable
sprinkling of plain, ordinary citizens.
who were rather doubtful about the
permanent good that the sanguine pre-
dicted would result from the meetings.
To this latter class / must confess
belonged. There was play going on
before US, with some of its features
more pathetic than any tragedy, and
others quite as amusing as any farce. |
What could be more touching than the
face of the patient, long-suffering wife,
aflame with the hope that at last refief
had come to her, and that the tempter
against whom her dissipated husband
was SO helpless to stand, would be
swept at once and forever from the
and by this new movement? What
more sad than to know, from the char
acter of the man, that her faith was
doomed to ultimate disappointment
What could be more amusing than the
of the politician in his en-
leavor to preserve his equilibrium on
he top rail of the political fence in the
torn, or the face of the merchant in
lis effort to forecast the effect on his
rade?
My sympathies went out to sisters ,
whose brothers the drink habit had y
AIKEN hold upon, to mothers whose /,
ons were afflicted with the same curse 8
'ut, somehow, I was impressed with t
he idea that this movement would he :
S evanescent as others that had gone
efore it. The immutable laws OF ].
uman nature were against its success;
'hile here and there an individual
from some movement like
hat we were witnessing, they were
he very rare exception that proved
ne rule. When the wave subsided the
asst majority were washed back into
leir old ruts. As I looked over the
ew recruits the thought occurred to
le that the present excitement supplied
he place of their accustomed stimulant
, many of them, and when that ex-
tement was over they would drift
ack to their old place at the bar again. !
his surmise, in the main, proved cor tt
ct. Like wave of the sea, this a
wave simply moved the 6
reat mass of people up and down, but ]
ot an inch forward. The lecture was I
ot profound intellectual treat. Van g
cit was neither pathetic nor amusing. s.
he local talent was much as usual. N
There was, however, an undertone p,
contempt for law running through it
ost of the speeches, that created IL
cling of uneasiness among the more n
oughtful. There was a s.higher nj
W." it was claimed, that was superior ps
human enactment, which the women ly
ere bound to obey. This is always %
g logic of the mob, and in this in
ance plainly meant that the one