The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1900-05-13
TO MAKE FRANCE SANE.
General Galliffets Attempt II I'm the
Right Direction.
New York Tribune.

New York Tribune.
movement against insanity has at last
been started in France. as they know who
read the columns of the Tribune carefully
yesterday. The amount of insanity In that
country is enormous No statistics OF re-
cent years are at hand at the moment, but
out of every thousand in France were in
sane. That is to say, two and half out
of every thousand were so insane that the
rest of the people recognized that they
insane and one was half insane. There
have never been any statistics of the
Frenchmen who were half insane. 1t Is
only an average.
The present movement against insanity
starts I'm the right place 1t does not tenn
porize where the cases are small and few
or attack the weak and the inconspicuous
should be made of the editors next. Only
one form of insanity Is menaced as yet
the form which the French, in their pictur-
holic." General Galliffet makes the attack
in the form of an order prohibiting the sale
of spirits, absinthe and vermouth in camps
and barracks. Nor is there any report that
the soldiers are to have any such compen-
sation as was the case with the American
man-o-war's man, on the famous occasion
when they raised his pay cents a day
and stopped his grog forever"
Soldiers, like other people in France, II
seems, use these liquors as appetiZers. but
there is no suggestion that the general
hopes by prohibiting them to save rations
as well as to prevent insanity. Hereafter
they can have wine. beer and cider, but
no spirits and no such brain-tearing decoc-
lions as absinthe.
No doubt the prohibition Is for the good
of France internally. as well as for that of
the soldiers, also internally. And when
the command is extended to editors Ii will
be for the good of France in its relations
with other nations. Ii is these ';absinthe-
minded beggars." as the English papers
call them. who make all the world believe
one comprehensive sheer at all foreign ma
tons; Ii Is not the government or the
people.
These men take their doses of absinthe
before dinner. then go and write articles on
the unspeakable wickedness of all who do
not believe that the French army is an
organization of legions of angels and the
French courts thrones of divine justice
and then they go and sit on the sidewalk
and dilute a single glass of absinthc with
Paris water for the rest of the night. They
do this till they have to be carried off and
added to the number In every thousand
who are insane and to the percentage of
the insane who have 1.-The foolishness al
coholic."
Absinthe is used a little In this country
A dash of ii is sometimes put in a cock
tail, and man who wants to get it's
medicinal effect sometimes takes more, but
there are few who take IL constantly and
in large quantities, they do in France
The cocktail habit itself is bad enough as
there is no need of wasting the present
space to prove, but IL is not like the alb
sinthe habit. The experiment which Gen.
eral Galliffet Is trying Is a most important
one, for IL the French army can be made
sane there is reason why ANYBODY In
the world should despair.