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THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.— SUPPLEMENT. 



him there, but is even too glad to go elsewhere 

 himself. That elsewhere is not like the rich 

 man's club, where he can order or not what he 

 likes ; but an English public-house, arranged ex- 

 clusively for drinking beer and spirits, and where, 

 in consequence of the monopoly price paid for the 

 good-will by the tenant, drinking immoderately 

 and rapidly is the understood and enforced rule. 



Hence the working-man is driven to drink 

 more than he ought ; and, once under the influence 

 of a slight excess, it too often happens that he 

 continues until he is more or less intoxicated. So 

 long as he is quiet and attentive to the interest of 

 the house, the publican plies him with more of 

 his baneful wares, until he is too noisy or too 

 stupid to drink more ; he is then put outside the 

 door, if need be with the policeman's aid. It is 

 true that some men go to a public-house in order 

 to get drunk, and they would be ill satisfied if a 

 moderate quantity of beer and of spirits failed to 

 produce the desired effect. These men, however, 

 form fortunately but a very small proportion of 

 those who frequent public- houses because they 

 have no other place of social meeting. The great 

 mass of our working-classes, who chiefly use our 

 public-houses, go there for conversation and social 

 intercourse, and for business purposes connected 

 with their various benefit and trade societies, 

 without having any intention or desire to overstep 

 the limits of moderation. Such views are not in 

 accordance with the desires of the publican, whose 

 sole aim, as I have said, is to recoup himself 

 rapidly for the heavy payment too often made for 

 the business. I maintain, then, that a very nat- 

 ural desire for social intercourse and amusement, 

 coupled with the fact, sadly too common, that 

 these are not always to be had at home, is the 

 chief cause for the general use of public-houses. 

 Once there, the workman must either continue to 

 drink, and that not too slowly, or then he is made 

 to understand that if he requires no more he had 

 better make room for others. Now, it is a notori- 

 ous fact that, in our large towns, even the rudest 

 sitting accommodation is being refused, since 

 drinking goes on faster and more profitably when 

 the customers are kept standing around a bar. 



Working-men's clubs, as established in some 

 towns by well-meaning phdanthropists, are no 

 doubt of some use, especially to those who are 

 members of the Good Templars' Society ; in such 

 clubs beer and spirits are forbidden, and books 

 and papers of a fitting kind are carefully selected 

 by the earnest clergyman or committee who man- 

 age the club. Such attempts, however, cannot 

 reach the masses ; the average English workman 



' is very much like the average member of the 

 middle or upper classes, and equally opposed to 

 having his social intercourse and relaxation man- 

 aged on goody principles. It may be sad to 

 think that a working-man prefers beer to soda- 

 water, the Weekly Dispatch to the British Work- 

 man ; but in this he resembles those who are 

 richer : and those who desire to succeed in reach- 

 ing and benefiting the masses must take other 

 measures than by offering them entertainment 

 based on the assumption that working-men are 

 but children, who will be content with sugar-and- 

 water and good books. The true remedy to 

 overcome the too great consumption of alcoholic 

 liquids is to place within the working-man's reach 

 a place of public entertainment such as a work- 

 man in a French or German town can go to. In 

 a German town, for example, the workman finds 

 a pleasant room wherein to meet his fellows and 

 others somewhat above him in the social scale. 

 Here he sits and amuses himself for one, two, or 

 even three hours with conversation, newspapers, 

 and games, and consumes his two or three Schop- 

 pen of beer, costing some fourpence. He can 

 also obtain a simple supper of sausage or cheese 

 and bread at a cost of twopence or threepence. 

 The French workman finds similar cheap places 

 of entertainment ; in the centre and south of 

 France the cheap wines of the district being sub- 

 stituted for beer. Every one who has lived or 

 traveled much abroad knows the small amount of 

 money spent even in a three hours' sitting by the 

 frequenters of such places. The landlord's in- 

 terest even there is, of course, to sell as much as 

 possible ; to him, however, it is a matter of indif- 

 ference whether it be coffee or beer, and as he 

 pays but little for the good-will — I am not now 

 describing a fashionable cafe in Paris — he can 

 afford to allow his customers to sit without com- 

 pelling them to drink rapidly for the benefit of 

 his trade. I would urge with some confidence — 

 derived from several years' residence abroad, and 

 from a considerable experience of the working- 

 classes there and at home — upon our statesmen, 

 our magistrates, our philanthropists, and indeed 

 upon all who desire to benefit the poorer classes 

 in our own country, the advantages which would 

 in time be derived from the establishment of 

 places of public entertainment based on aims 

 other than those of the gin-palace. Permissive 

 legislation has already in many important in- 

 j stances been adopted, and to this principle, for 

 example, we are indebted for the efforts now be- 

 ing made by many municipal bodies to improve 

 the dwellings of the poor. Better lodging, bet- 



