The daily morning journal and courier., 1901-10-26

take nOn-alCOnOllc drinks, because upon the latter, in addition to his fixed sala- ry, he will get. a generous commission. He will also have an inducement to push the sale of food, for this depart ment of the business will be entirely his own venture, and to his own private purse will accrue all that can be made out oc it.
 This slum public has hitherto been uncleanly. It has been a place where filthy language could often be heard, and where the landlord, who has bare ly eked out a living, would have every incentive to encourage excess and to break those wholesome provisions of the law which forbid the selling of li- quor to children and drunkards. But under the Peoples Refreshment House association all these features will be changed. Everything must be scrupu- lously clean. The occasional unexpec- ted visit of an inspector will insure that this rule is regarded and also that the atmosphere is kept as pure as pos Gible morally, and that none of the re- strictive features of the license laws are broken. Tea, coffee and cocoa will be obtainable at all hours, and these, with other temperance beverages, Will be kept to the front in the arrangement of the k-in- trade. Always, too, there will be pitchers of good, cool Wa ter on the counter, with glasses at hand, and the general public will be in- formed that these are for public ser vice without cost. All the same, though, this house, like the others managed by this reform. association, will keep in stock every kind of liquor and beer, and the manager and his barmaids will serve the same to all corners who are of proper age and who do not give evidence of inebriety. They will be obliged to do this, just as other publicans are, by the provision of their license.
 Naturally one wonders to what eX- tent, If at all, these changes will reduce the consumption of alcoholic beverages, and this, l must say, is a point which the experience of this association, so far as it has gone, has not clearly set tied. Captain Boehmer was given op- portunity to assure me upon this point, but he didn't do it, and the three re- formed houses to which he referred, WHICH were Iue llISl lllISt lliC dSSoSid- tion tackled, were rather against the theory of reduction than in favor of it. The first was dirty place. and being frightened up under it's reform man agement, it drew more custom. In the second case the inn taken over by the association had not been badly con ducted before, but no custom was lost through the change, the call for beer and spirits being under reform govern ment about as 1t was when run for pro- fit by a private individual. But in the third case there was a falling off This, however, was not attributed by Captain Boehmer to any abatement of alcoholic craving wrought by the new form of management, but was due, he thought, to a more aggressive bid for patronage on the part of public houses in the same neighborhood that were run on the old lines This looks rather ominous. But the movement is per haps not far enough to permit clear judgment upon this point, and mean while it is surely some gain to the cause of decency and sobriety to have high toned management brought to bear upon such places, to have the law rigidly kept and to know that the profits are for the benefit of the many in public Improvements rather than for the enlistment of the few
 One thing, at any rate, has been de- monstrated by this new movement, and that is that public houses run on this reform basis can be depended upon to yield both the five per cent guaranteed to shareholders and the five per cent. which is to be laid by as a sinking fund The Peoples Refreshment House association, though it has been at work but four years, is annually meeting these drafts, and it still, for two years past, has had a surplus of about five hundred dollars a year for distribution to the public. One of the principles upon which these profits are distributed is that they must never re- lieve local taxation, buy must be given to objects which are desirable, but which still are beyond the province of either rates or taxes. How far this rule has been observed and how widely varied are the local improvements made possible under this new plan of running the saloons for the benefit of the public-of these things the reader may judge from the following appro- priations for a single year: Improved water supply to village, fifty-five dol lars; erection of fountain, fifty dollars; for district nurse. one hundred and fif- ty dollars; Clothing club, nursing fund and village green, fifty-fve dollars; Mustual Improvement association, in- firmary flower show and foal show, one hundred and fifty dollars; village reading room, twenty-five dollars; school fund.- twenty-five dollars. These sums were given, of course in different places, and the aim is to benefit every locality where this association is en- gagged in he liquor business in about the ratio in which that particular nelghborhood gives their business paying support.
 But eighteen reformed houses in the whole of Great Brltain-what small part of the great mass of such places, and how slow the progress since the movement began in 1896! True enough, l and if the future development were still ,.;+ ;c pan,1aig Pnfrn 1T1onf