GREAT BRITAIN'S METHOD

Associated Press Correspondence

LONDON, Oct. 22, 1918.-Drunkenness and death from alcoholism in the United Kingdom show a decline ranging from 65 to 80 per cent. since the war regulations against drinking were instituted by the Government, three years ago, according to Lord D'Abernon, Chairman of the Liquor Control Board.

Abolition of the custom of "treating" and drinking on an empty stomach and the virtual extinction of the saloon loafer were the main factors contributing to the growing tendency to national temperance, Lord D'Abernon told the Associated Press.

"The lines on which we have proceeded," he continued, "are to a large extent novel, and they have succeeded beyond expectation. Nor is there any evidence of growth of the drug habit, which is usually one of the consequences of too drastic interference with facilities for obtaining liquor.

"This happy absence of undesirable features I attribute to the fact that, while facilities have been greatly curtailed, the liquor shops being open five and one-half hours daily, compared with eighteen or nineteen before the war, our arrangement of two periods, one at midday and the other in the evening, has been found sufficient by those who desire reasonable refreshment and nothing more, and those are, of course, the vast majority of drinkers. We are not out to interfere with them. It is the loafer and soaker, who would drink, if he could, from dawn to dusk, who interferes with national efficiency and whom we are out to stop. I think we have succeeded in that."

Drinking on an empty stomach, he remarked, was one cause of intoxication which the hours fixed for the sale of liquor tend to check. Those hours are from noon to 2:30 and from 6:30 to 9:30 in the evening. Most drinks consequently are taken with meals.

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On charts illustrating the temperance advance in England and Wales, Lord D'Abernon traced the declines of ills incident to alcoholism. "The delirium tremens and alcohol mortality figures," he said, "are of special importance as showing that there cannot have been any diversion of excessive drinking from the public house to the home."

He thought that the abolition of treating had also contributed largely to the gain in temperance. "This measure," he said, "had as its objective the elimination of the custom whereby groups of workers, after receiving their week's wages, spent a considerable part of it in 'standing their corners,' until each member of the party had in turn paid for drinks all round-to the detriment both of their working efficiency and of the happiness of their wives and families. The wonderful sobriety of the army and navy is due in no small degree to the restrictions on treating.

"Altogether we have much reason for satisfaction. Under conditions which, on previous occasions, had led to a great increase of intemperance the great demand for labor, plentitude of money, perpetual excitement and strain-we in this country are able to record an unprecedented decrease of intemperance. There has been a great saving of national efficiency, a great saving of life and improvement in the public health.

"No similar progress has, so far as I am aware, been accomplished in any country at any period. The British public have shown their comprehension of the vital importance of maximum national efficiency by accepting severe discipline in the best possible spirit. Now that the immense national benefit is proved, they will certainly never go back to pre-war conditions."

SOME REMARKABLE STATISTICS

LONDON, Jan. 1, 1919.—In a recent address before the Royal Arts Society, Lord D'Abernon, Chairman of the (Liquor) Board of Control, quoted statistics showing remarkable decreases in intoxica

tion and other evils due to drink. He gave figures for certain selected cities as follows:

Quoting statistics of more general application, it seems that the number of persons proceeded against for habitual drunkenness in England and Wales, which in 1913 amounted to 332, was in 1917 only 27, whilst admissions to inebriate reformatories declined from 310 to 29 in the same period.

The Temperance Council of Christian Churches has formulated a programme of "nine points." They may be briefly summarized:

(1) Sunday closing.

(2) Restriction of hours for the sale of drink on week days. (3) Reduction of the number of licensed premises.

(4) Increase of the power of local licensing authorities.

(5) Control of clubs.

(6) The abolition of grocers' licenses.

(7) The prohibition of the sale of intoxicating liquor to young persons.

(8) Local option.

(9) The provision of alternatives to the liquor tavern for nonalcoholic refreshment, recreation and social intercourse.

RUSSIA'S EXPERIMENT

Russia's experiment in prohibition, inaugurated at the opening of the Great War, has excited an interest throughout the world, second only to the startling and dramatic political events in that country. The protagonists of either side of the drink question, as might be expected, have utilized the Russian situation to the utmost. From the out-and-out opponents of alcoholic beverages of all kinds, we had the most glowing tales of prosperity of the population, despite the burdens of the war, of great increases in savings, of gains in industrial and military efficiency and in national health. From the other side we had stories of an enormous development in illicit distilling, of tremendous traffic in noxious substitutes for alcoholics, many of them positively poisonous, and of a weakened morale on the part of the civil and military populations. The prohibitionists pointed to the downfall of the autocracy as an accomplishment of a people freed from the curse of liquor. His opponent found in prohibition the explanation for the growth of Bolshevism, with its massacres and shameful betrayal of allied nations.

The truth, it may be conjectured, lies somewhere between these two extremes. Actual and complete knowledge of the effects of prohibition in Russia possibly will never be attained by the rest of the world, but a succinct and valuable addition to the stock of information on the subject comes in the form of a monograph lately published by Prof. J. Y. Simpson, D.Sc., F.R.S.E., of the chair of National Science in New College, Edinburgh. (Some Notes on the

State Sale Monopoly and Subsequent Prohibition of Vodka in Russia; London, 1918; P. S. King & Son, Limited, 1s. 6d. net.) The pamphlet, which is based upon a report furnished to the British Board of Liquor Control, whose success in promoting temperance in the United Kingdom is well known, was written from data gathered in Russia in May, 1917. An additional chapter, however, brings the situation practically up to date.

The State Monopoly of the sale of vodka, instituted at the urging of Prime Minister Witte in 1895, had several purposes in view. It sought first to provide a pure liquor of uniform strength (40 per cent. of alcohol by volume) in place of the adulterated drinks then widely sold; second by such regulations as the forbidding of drink upon sale premises to reduce the volume of drunkenness and to check carousing; third, to improve the economic conditions of the agricultural villages or communes by affording a steady market, through the distilleries, for the surplus rye, potatoes and maize, from which materials the spirit was manufactured; fourth, to increase the public revenues. Three-quarters o fthis program was speedily realized. Adulterated spirits practically disappeared in the face of the pure liquor of standard quality rectified by the Government and sold in Government shops; the economic conditions in the villages improved because of the cash market for surplus crops; the Imperial treasury obtained an abundant and increasing revenue, averaging in the decade 1904-1913 the handsome sum of 500,000 rubles yearly, representing the profit on the operations of the monopoly. But drunkenness and kindred evils did not decrease; on the contrary, the per capita consumption of alcohol mounted year by year, and the drink problem became increasingly grave.

When, in the summer of 1914, Russia met the Austro-German challenge with the mobilization of her military forces, temporary prohibition was decreed. The memory of the drunkenness among the troops, at the outset of the Russo-Japanese war, and the distressing consequences thereof, were still fresh in mind. After mobilization the orders were extended from time to time and finally made permanent. The sale of vodka, vodka preparations and all other spirits was absolutely prohibited; the sale of wine of a strength not exceeding 16 per cent. alcohol, was permitted only in the larger