The Birmingham age-herald., 1920-01-16

Bone dryl
 National prohibition is effective to- day.
 These United States hold the sale of any beverage containing more than one-half of l per cent alcohol to be a violation of the federal law. January 16, 1920. has arrived. To some it will go down In history as the day of lamentation. to others as the dawn breaking gloriously over the promised land.
 John de Quincy Barleycorn is dead They have chiseled the bar" out of Barleycorn, and put the bar on Barley corn. but taken the bars out of every thing and everywhere else. The French would write for Johns epitaph, "C'est fini."
 And yet, and yet. no few minds will go back to the days when work was done and a few choice spirits gathered,
 were foregathered and gathered in a
 few choice spirits.
 The tops of the tables were round. of polished oak. whitened by the repeated passage over them of damp cloths in ostentatious wipes by swift, itching black hands. There were white sanded floors, little china match box holders and china saucers, advertisements stamped in them in gaily colored let lcIS. OuI men dt a tdples one WOulO turn toward the distant counter, raise his hand, fingers extended. thumb turned it. and swiftly white aproned man bent behind the counter. reap peared with tray of four creamy glasses, deftly with an ivory wand he flicked the foam from the frosted fer inent, leaving half an inch of the creamy crest on each glass and the rest tawny, sparkling beaker of delicious ness. And again a. swiftly moving grinning darky approached bearing the battered tray with the four glasses and four hungry beaks would be plunged in the beakers. to be withdrawn with sigh as the last trickle vanished. THEM WAS THE HAPPY DAYS"
 Oh, boy! oh. boy. Them was the happy days!'
 or, maybe. it wasn't beer they were after Mayhap two old gentlemen sat under the shade of wistaria trapped portico, old gentlemen 1inen-clad and seated in chairs of twisted branches piled high with soft cushions. With an ivory headed cane the major taps smartly on the iron balustrade; Old Lance appears--somehow they always name him Lance.
 He asks no questions. For 30 years those two smart raps have meant but k, always said to shuffle-away to the pantry and is lost behind the door for 10 minutes. Then he reappears with silver salver supporting two long, lean, limpid glasses, their tops riot of nodding mint, just a dust of pow dered sugar at the bottom. no garish slices of lemon and pineapple or bob bing cherry therein, just the straight goods with a dust of sugar, a dash of tAex Ia, tt@1,z t<n .4nx. crushed ice and shot of the captive sunshine of the Kentucky mountains. The third glass was left in the pantry, and after setting down the silver tray Lance vanishes.
 But John Barleycorn paid other vis- it's. not anyways in convivia1 company. He choose his chums at random. May be on the afternoon the four good fell lows were drinking their beer and the two old gentlemen slipping their juleps,- John may have gone to the little un- painted house in the alley, and entered.
 The air inside the little house is heavy for lack of ventilation. A half dressed woman swinging crying baby from side to side bends over a crib and looks at little pinched face where typhoid has set it's mark of owner
 THE DARKER PICTURE
 Three days and three nights the doc- tor and 4the mother have been fighting to produce a precipitation to break the fever, but as yet the skin of the little patient is dust-dry and glistening like silk. At midnight the woman is to give the little patient an alcohol bath, and for the purpose there stands on the mantle shelf pint bottle of cheap whisky
 Half asleep she sits beside the crib bending closer once in while to catch the fevered muttering of the little dry lips.
 The door of t1.e room is kicked open. X man lurches in. stands teetering n fool ish smile on his red face. Dumping against the crib. he walks uncertainty to the fireplace. picks up the bottle and lets it's contents gurgle down his throat. a few unnoticed drops oozng and tub- bling out of tI.e corners of his mouth. He pats the sobbing woman absentmind- edly on the lead and lurches out of the house again.
 But John Bareycorn is deadl
 "Ycn can hear the dead march play. The regiments in hollow square. They're marchin' him away
 IN THE DAYS OF NOAH
 When Japhet and Ham stole softly to the goatskin lean-to in the foothills of Mount Ariat. peered in and saw Noah lying naked and dirty, sloshed to the gills with Cheap booze, the matter became llic-