Year: 1869




have startling facts brought to their
knowledge in reference to family affairs.
1t is fortunate for the peace of households
that doctors, as a rule, set guard upon
their tongues, and that it is deemed a
breach of professional etiquette to disclose
the secrets they learn in the course of
their practice. Sometimes, however, a
habit becomes so common that it is no
longer possible to keep silence respecting
it. 10 saps the Vigor of thousands, causes
unspeakable anxiety and misery, sows dis.
sensiOns in innumerable households, and
finally hurries the unhappy victim into a
premature grave Unless the evidence of
medical men is to be rejected, such a habit
is now running its course among us. The
indications cannot be misunderstood bv
the professional eye. Every doctor has
had cases produced by it within the range
of his experience And it is scarcely pos
sible that his skill can be exercised upon
a more insidious or hopeless malady. We
refer, of course, to the custom of dram
drinking in private, under pretence of
taking Wholesome tonic" as reStOra-
tive of the system The tonic, no matter
under what false name it is sold, is gene
rally mischievous alcoholic stimulant,
which, by the spirits of evil let loose from
bottle by traveller in the Arabian
Nights, proves the bane of young and old,
the curse of every household into which it
enters, and the ruin of every woman who
is foolish enough to place herself beneath
its spell.


The mysterious maladies (which alarm
the heads of households are frequently to
be traced to the deleterious compounds
sold as "bitters," and warranted by the
makers to cure half the diseases flesh is
heir to. The basis of these mixtures is
nothing but whisky, favored and disguised
to give some excuse for the preteXt under
which it is Sold Analysis will show that
what is represented as glass of healthy
bitters is almost always the Circean cup,
destined to acquire an increasing influence
over the unhappy dupe who drains it,
until at last she becomes hopelessly de-
graded. The victims are chiefly women !;
for when men want to drink, they can find
plenty of chances of doing it openly.
They can ask for whisky over counter
without exciting scandal. But woman
cannot walk into bar-rOOm and call for
"bourbon or "rye." 1t is for her, there
fore, that preparations ofbitters, under all
sorts of fantastic names, are scattered
broadcast over the land She is innocent
of any ill intention in taking them
She is not aware that she is really
running her constitution by imbibing
daily doses of alcohol. But in the
course of time her husband notices
that her health IS failing. Her nervous
system is deranged, her appetite disap-
pears, she rises in the morning tired and
feverish, her head is always aching, her
hand shakes, and she is subject to constant
depression of spirits. The husband looks
on at these symptoms with pain and
grief but he is at loss to account for
them, because he does not suspect
the demon which turks in the apparently
harmless bottle of "bitters" slowed
away in the cupboard. He tries change
of air, but it does no good, and no wonder
the fatal bottle goes with his wife, in
her trunk. At last the doctor is called in,
and he at once detects in the unfortunate
woman all the disastrous effects of hard
drinking. We have heard on good
authority that the patient is sometimes
discovered to be on the very verge of
delirium tremens The horror of the hus-
band, when this fact comes to his knowl-
edge, may be imagined; but although his
wife may be temporarily cured. the evil
ascendancy too often returns, and the
flower Of her life is cruelty poisoned.


Any medical man in large practice would
youch for it that we do not exaggerate the
deplorable wreck of mind and body pro-
duced by this kind of dram drinking. 1t
is extending everywhere, although not
under identically the same disguises. In
France the cOncOction may be called a
"water," in England "spirits of orange
flower" but everywhere it is the same
baleful compound---alcOhOl is present be-
| meath all the artifices that may be enl-
ployed, and when once a woman has sold
herself to the evil spirit, her freedom, her
happiness, and her health are alike sacri-
feed. She may not know what she is
doing. She feels that her strength is fail
| ing, and she finds that the habit of slipping
at the black bottle infuses into her for a
time new animation. She may sincerely
believe that the fatal draught is really COM
posed, as its makers assert, of some life
giving herb or plant. She ascribes
her declining health to any .and
every cause but the right one,
Consequently she goes on tippling
until il is too late To undo the mischief
| which has been wrought The bottle of
"bitters" is often replenished, and each
dose inflicts n new blow upon her consti-
tuition. But the taste for IL Increases rap
| idly, until i'm the end IL becomes uncon-
aucrable, and the wrctched slave To the
bottle has remorse for her companion un-
| ill the last hour. 1t is melancholy pic
ture, but it would startle all of US if we