ALCOHOL : AN ENEMY OF HOME AND COMMUNITY 



547 



Effect of beer drinking on children. Mr. Bayer investi- 

 gated the habits of some children in a school in Vienna. 

 Some of these children were total abstainers, some were 

 occasional drinkers, some drank beer or wine once daily, 

 and others drank it twice daily. The rank of these children 

 was obtained from their teachers as " good," " fair," or 

 " poor." The following table shows how the different 

 groups of children compared in their rank. 



This shows that the work of those children who drank 

 beer was not as good as that of those who were abstainers, 

 and that those who drank the most did the poorest work. 



Getting a position. Still another great drawback that 

 attends the use of alcohol is the fact that it handicaps a 

 young man in looking for a position. There are some posi- 

 tions, such as those on certain railroads, for which a man 

 will not be engaged if he uses alcohol, and in many other 

 situations employers hire abstainers in preference to the 

 drinker. So all along the line a young man who drinks 

 finds himself seriously handicapped in life. 



Alcohol an enemy of the home. The ill effects of the use 

 of alcohol on the man who uses it are bad enough, but vastly 

 worse are the indirect effects on the drinker's wife and chil- 

 dren. It is pitiful to think that young children who have 

 done nothing to deserve it should be punished because their 

 father uses alcohol. And yet this is what is happening in 

 thousands of homes all over the country. In some cases 

 the condition is so bad that it is generally known to the 

 public ; in other cases it is partly concealed. 



