to sew 'em up in a bale of wool. to that by my mates." I was put up M.- Do you know the cause of your disease?" M.-"It's the result of long-continued drunken ness. S." Well, that's what the doctor said it was. So I suppose it must be so." This man remained some time upon my district, and became improved in health. He frequently sought my advice as a religious teacher, and acting upon what I advised, respecting his drunkenness, resolved, he declared to me, to become a total abstainer. He was advised by me to get out to Sydney, where he was well-known, as soon as possible, and get a hut-keeper's place as far up the Bush as he could, because the further from Sydney the more difficult it is to obtain alcoholic drinks. "Aye," said he, "I shall take your reverence's advice; it's for my good it is; and you're lucky to me. When I was out of reach of the cussed drink, I did very well I did, sober and solid as you may say." This poor man, J. S., could neither read nor write, and was one of those reckless sort of sailors who are at the mercy of every rogue. Full of the drollest sayings imaginable, and, poor wretch! full also of misery. From the condition to which his liver had become reduced, if he recommenced drinking I should consider he would very soon die. He appeared pleased to receive instruction respecting his soul. I pray it might have produced more conviction of sin than was apparent. I give the case simply as illustrative of drunkenness being as great a bane to our colonies as to the mother-country. I could, did the dimensions assigned to this work permit, relate various other instances of enormous individual expenditure in drink. One sailor, who voyaged to the Arctic Circle with Sir John Ross, informed me that after a whaling voyage he spent sixty pounds in a few days. At the time he mentioned this circumstance to me he was a member of a Temperance Society. respects the duties on alcoholic liquors, we remember that they are, to a large extent, consumed in the punishment of crime. A very different sum, also, to eleven millions sterling annually would suffice for poor's-rates, but for the drinking usages of the lower orders. As The national energy requisite to shake off this incubus is to be derived but from one sourcethe prevalence of vital Christianity. The only true security for a man's sobriety is his spirituality. All real blessing abides secure only under the wing of Jesus: * "There is no hope for a sinful earth, Nor can there ever be, Save in that new and heavenly birth, Delirium tremens is a very affecting disease produced by drunkenness, with which I have repeatedly met. The delusions attendant on this horrid disease, which is a malady of common occurrence to drunkards, are really numberless. One eminent medical writer, Dr. Grindrod, in Bacchus," thus sums up the concomitants of this terrible disorder : "Pale countenance, weakness, languor, emaciation, want of appetite, coldness of the hands and feet, cold moisture over the whole surface of the body, cramp in the extremities, slow pulse, giddiness, nausea and vomiting, with extreme anxiety about the most trivial circumstances, combined with frightful dreams, are among the most prominent of these painful and distressing symptoms, which stamp the character of this disorder, and indicate its awful approach. "The mind becomes indescribably harassed with phantasies of the most hideous and unnatural description. Objects most calculated to produce loathsome and horrifying feelings, keep the unfortunate sufferer in a state of inexpressible disquietude and anxiety. At one period, for example, they imagine disgusting vermin to be creeping about the body; at other times, dangers of an appalling description are looked upon as holding out prospects of momentary destruction; while the most alarming suspicions are entertained even of those who, under different circumstances, were esteemed as valued relations and friends." "To produce this condition of the system," says Dr. Grindrod, "it is not necessary that an extreme degree of intoxication be superinduced. It is not unusual for individuals to be capable of attending to the concerns of life with some degree of propriety, and yet be in such a state that at some favourable opportunity this terrible disease shall suddenly display itself in all its terrific characters. By some medical writers, delirium tremens has been considered as 'forming a sort of connecting link between mania and fever.'"* Parties labouring under this chastisement for their sins, I have observed to be quite sensible that delusions by which they were infatuated were delusions, and yet, as one expressed to me," they seem as strong as if they were real.” The hallucination of snakes crawling about the person, and dogs gnawing the joints, is not an uncommon form of delusion under which such sufferers labour, and the sleeplessness and mental misery induced I have observed to reduce the system deplorably. One person who came under my notice was remunerating a man to sit up with him, as he felt so horribly inclined, he said, to commit suicide; whilst thus guarded he kept a * Armstrong on Fever," p. 310. bottle of gin under his pillow, and in frequent use! The delusions under which he laboured were of a most extraordinary character; the sufferer was worn to the bone by sleeplessness and agony of mind. He was persuaded to abandon all intoxicating drinks, and in the course of several months became an altered man. One scene of morbid imagination previously present with him he described thus-" There, as I lay in my bed, no sooner were my eyes closed, than the room seemed filled with beings of the most horrid appearance; they were searching all round the room, and talking to one another; all appeared to have some design upon me; I heard one say, 'He'll soon be dead; we shall soon have him with us;' then a large black horse came tearing down some hills, making straight for the bed, whilst I trembled, and the perspiration ran off me." In the day he was harassed by the most extraordinary delusions, as he walked, as he sat, everywhere. A man of much muscular power, he was being worn to a skeleton, and to the weakness of a child, beneath the effects of this terrible result of sin. Dr. Macnish, an eminent physician of Glasgow, |
