The semi-weekly messenger. [volume] (Wilmington, N.C.) 1897-1908, 1901-04-19
The Need of the Hour

wilmington. April To-
Editors Messenger: I have recently
heard of a movement to form in Will
mington "A Woman's Christian Tenn
perance Union and apropos to the sub
Ject 1t seems to me that the crying
need or the hou here IN Wilmington as
in many other places. is an awaken
ing OF Christian public sentiment upon
subject of social wine drinking.
This is an evil that is insidious in its
influence and wholly evil. n is grow
ing more and more widespread year by
year. 1t is the very k~intergarten to the
saloons, and to me il is something SIM
ply awful to see as. as 1 recently saw,
on a fashionable festive occasion. a
young mother take her boy so young he
could not talk plain and lead him by
n hand to the punch bowl to get from
her hands the first taste of that &C
cursed thing which twenty years from
now may lay him in the gutter.
When boys in their teens are given
their first taste of champagne by fash
ionable ladies in the homes of the Chris
tan men, surely it IS time for some
body to protest. 1t is getting such a
hold upon our people. or else our people
are under such slavery to the dictates
most fashionable necessity to serve
wine and punch at every function" to
Wine and punch at every function" to
which the elite are invited. And who
I'D SdS II IS harmless /. II any udTeS,
L can give him the name of a gentle
man who some years ago escorted one
young lady to a fashionable residence
in this city to a reception and escorted
four young ladies to their homes. Why?
Because the escorts of three of them
were drunk in the parlor of their host.
Subsequently this same gentleman es-
corted a young lady to another "func-
ton at this same house. She was an
innocent and pure minded girl who had
been reared in a godlv home at a dis
lance from the temptations and allur-
mentS of such fashionable society"
and had never seen any social wine
drinking. At first she refused to touch
the punch and wine. but between being
politely laughed at and urged by host
and friends CD she Welded and tool as
much as some of her more seasoned
sisters, and the result was she was car
ried home in a carriage some hou
Observation-Disclosures" her escort called
it as he left her at the door of the hos
pitable home where h was visiting.)
Of course. these are extreme cases,
Though far from ~uniaue). but the fact
that such things are possible in this
quiet, Christian community. and worse
still, that those whom such things most
nearly touch are so under the dominion
of fashionable society that they dare
not cry out in protest against them, is
cIOuSu W dIOuSe us " tIc clloTllllly
and the extent of this evil.
And after all it is not such cases as
1 nave cited that in the long run eX-
ert the most baneful influence. The in
f1uence of the moderate drinker is far
worse than that of the drunkard, for no
one ever wishes Cor %expects) to become
a drunkard, but many a young man
seeing a respected gentleman, perhaps
a number, possibly even an officer, of
n church he attends. taking, appar-
emily without harm. a social glass OF
wine or something wen stronger, sees
no harm in accepting at a fashionable
reception from the hand of a fair young
lady Cor her mother) his first glass Of
wine, and so begins that course which
may sooner or later Law him in a drunk
ards grave by the side of his broken
hearted mother. The ranks of the
drunkards are always recruited from
h moderate drinkers. No man ever
begins to be a drunkard at once, and it
often. how sadly often. begins in the
social glass of wine.
The other day MI. j. Pierpont Nor
gan organized the most ~stupendous
commercial organization that the
world has ever seen-the wonder of the
age! Capital over a thousand million
dollars! And yet the drink bill of the
United States for one year. the year
of 1900, could wipe it out Of existence
and leave S72. 493. 445.
Some Of us complain of the fact that
we spent (perhaps wasted) 5000, 600, 900
in the Philippines last year: why not
complain because nearly six times hat
sum was certainly wasted for drink?
We spent as much for liquor as the
total value of all u exports of all
kinds of merchandise to all parts of
the world. We spent six times as much
for liquor as for all the public schools
of the nation. and nearly four times as
much as the farm value of the entire
cotton crop.
But why multiply figures! 1T is the
consumer that pays" $50 the liquor
dealers tell us)). Is that so? Last
week my collector called at a house to
ask for the rent and found the mother
in tears and the children in rags, and
learned that the husband and father
(and incidentally the "consumer") af-
ter an absence of four days, had turn
ed up to calmly inform his wife that he
could no longer support them. Gle had
to support the liquor dealer Unsteady
I ask who paid?' I gave money last
week to help support an orphan of a
late drunken "consumer:'-who paid?
Public sentiment, Public sentiment,
That is what is wanted. Enlightened,
Christian public sentiment against
whiskey drinking and against its pa
rent-social. fashionable wine drink
ing. w. NJ. CUMMING.