18 JULY 1925, Page 16

THE DRINK QUESTION

[To the Editor of the SPECTATOR.] Sm,—With reference to the interesting article by J. St. Loe Strachey on " The Drink Question," in your issue of June 27th, may I, please, recall some wise words by the late Bishop of Oxford on "The Drink Trade and Politics" : "If there is no legislation and we drift on, we are running the risk of entrench- ing, year by year, more and more strongly, the amalgamated interests of the Trade which, on the one hand, is so powerful and so penetrating as to be able to influence large departments of our political life, and, on the other hand, is so large and so.

powerful that those who conduct it with the very best inten- tions in the world are compelled to act upon the maxim that business is business, and to put the attractiveness and the prosperity of their business in the first place. That business is no ordinary business, and those who conduct it incur no ordinary responsibility " ? —I am, Sir, &c., HAROLD BUCHE, Gislcham Rectory, Lowestoft.