2i8 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



vestigation was made all but two or three had paid the United States 

 special tax, which is 'prima facie evidence of violation of the liquor 

 law. Druggists can not legally sell liquor for medicinal purposes, 

 as this is the purpose for which the city agency exists. Not less than 

 twenty of the forty-five drug stores in Portland are merely dram- 

 shops in disguise. 



Much of the family trade is supplied by wholesale dealers and by 

 bottlers of mineral waters, and a number of express companies are 

 ready to place orders for their customers in Boston and other cities, 

 while some of the local expresses fill orders for liquors from their 

 own well-supplied storage rooms. 



Of the one place in the city where liquor is legitimately sold, 

 Mr. Koren says: " On the occasion of the writer's first visit to the 

 Portland liquor agency he was greeted with these words by one of 

 the attendants : ' This is nothing but a legalized rum shop — that's 

 all.' The statistics abundantly vindicate this assertion. It was 

 explained that certain formalities were observed. Thus the name 

 and address of each purchaser are recorded. ' Of course,' the in- 

 formant went on, ' there are some we don't sell to and won't sell to 

 (for instance, intoxicated persons and habitual drunkards), but if 

 a respectable person comes in we don't ask questions.' " 



The inquiries of the committee's agent were not confined to 

 cities. Farmington, the county seat of Franklin County, sixty miles 

 back from the seacoast, was spoken of by well-informed prohibition- 

 ists as a place where the law worked under the most favorable condi- 

 tions. The town contains four villages and had three thousand two 

 hundred and seven inhabitants in 1890, of whom only one hundred 

 and seven were of foreign birth. Yet here liquor selling is far from 

 being unknown. " Five United States special liquor taxes were paid 

 for by residents in 1894. At two of the hotels both malt and distilled 

 liquors are supplied to guests in their rooms, and not infrequently 

 to others who drop in; but there are no bars. At one of the three 

 drug stores, at least, liquor can be bought by any trusted customer. 

 Furthermore, it is said by old residents that illicit sales are v carried 

 on intermittently at from one to three other places, but their identity 

 is not easily revealed. An official, whose duty it is to enforce pro- 

 hibition, is quoted as saying that ' from one to six packages of liquor 

 arrive by express every day.' " 



The report contains a review of the working of prohibition 

 throughout the State by counties. Every city in Maine, except 

 Auburn, has its United States licenses, and in no manufacturing town 

 with a large number of French-Canadian operatives has the pro- 

 hibitory law ever been strictly enforced. The tipplers of Auburn 

 find prohibition endurable, for a short bridge connects their city 



