THE TEMPERANCE FAILURE 155 



of these experiments may be gauged from the 

 following : 



" The Maori Chiefs in the ' King Country,' New Zealand, have 

 asked the Government to substitute a limited licensing system for 

 the Prohibition which is in force at present, and under which 

 liquor of bad quality is being sold everywhere. Mr Seddon, the 

 Premier, approves of the proposal. He told a deputation that the 

 Chiefs and the police were unanimous in stating that Prohibition 

 had spread the evil it was intended to exclude. Sly grog-selling 

 is rampant, and could not be stopped. The same thing was 

 going on in the Clutha district, in Otago, where there were no 

 Maoris, and where Prohibition was enforced by popular vote." ^ 



" The Clutha Prohibition is not the only one we have had in 

 New Zealand. A Local Option law existed in this colony many 

 years ago. Under its provisions, it was open to the people in any 

 district to vote ' No License.' In the North Seventy Mile Bush, 

 in the Hawke's Bay province, in a township called Ormondville, 

 a man who had drunk himself mad went home one day and 

 murdered his wife and four or five children. Naturally a thrill of 

 horror passed through the district, and when the next Local 

 Option poll was taken the people voted solidly and solemnly for 

 ' No License.' The public-houses in Makotutu, Ormondville, and 

 Norsewood were closed for three years. Did drinking and 

 drunkenness cease ? No. The drinking customs of the people 

 underwent a change for the worse ; sly grog-selling became 

 rampant, and more liquor was ordered for consumption in that 

 district than ever before or since. In private houses bottles were 

 kept from which any one might help himself, so long as he 

 deposited the requisite sixpence per nip on the mantel-shelf In 

 more than one instance this led to the woman of the household 

 cultivating a taste for liquor, with the inevitable result that secret 

 dram-drinking led to the downfall of women who would never 

 otherwise have known the taste of liquor. Secret rooms were 



1 Morning Post, 29th October 1900. 



