LETTERS TO THE EDITOR.
[Letters of the length of one of our leading paragraphs are often more read, and therefore more effective, titan those which fill treble the space.]
BREAD : A CHOICE.
[To THE EDITOR OP THE " SPECTATOR:1 SIR,—" The situation is so grave; especially with regard to bread, that something bringing home to every citizen in the land his or her individual responsibility has got to be done, and done at once." A little actual experience is worth pages of precept. My household—we belong to the despised middle class—had the gravity of the situation brought home to them some time ago, and being anxious like others to do—or save—their bit, and feeling that hard manual workers needed it more than they did, decided to give up wheaten bread altogether. Cook rose to the occasion and nobly produced whole-barley cakes—quite edible— with a sauce of patriotism. On trying to purchase more barley flour to continue the process the answer was: " There is none to be had." Why? Has it gone to make whisky and beer? I confess to a desire for both beverages, but really do not wish to satisfy it by taking what people want for food, so since the war have " downed glasses," except about once a month just to show I am not a " fanatical teetotaler." The results of "taking the children's food "—I hear of sick children for whom a little necessary sugar cannot be procured—and using it to make intoxicating drink are not encouraging. Take a few almost at random. A lady working at a creche, helping and instructing poor mothers, has just told me of three young children left nncared for because the mother has received a term of hard labour for drunkenness and assault. Another social worker tells how the police loathe the task of bringing men who have been serving at the front with credit before the Magistrates for drunkenness on their return; another lady, having giving up her car (like many others, she spends her time now knitting and her money in buying wool for soldiers' warm socks), how noisy drunken women have made the omnibus intolerable; another, working hard in a manufacturing town, how a soldier coming on leave from the front finds his wife helplessly drunk, his home ruined, breaks her head, and goes to gaol instead of back to France.. The Times of April 26th reports the case of a conviction of a procuress, and the landlady of the flat said " that Colonial soldiers had been taken to the house in a very drunken condition." These are a few examples out of hundreds that could be given. Are these results really good enough to warrant the expenditure of precious foodstuffs to obtain them? Why not at once (1) prohibit the sale of spirits except for medical purposes, and so far as the naval or military authorities think a ration desirable for wearied fighting men; (2) prohibit entirely the use of edible grain or sugar in the manufacture of any intoxi- cating drink? Some of the malt already made might perhaps be used up for light beer. Will anything less than this meet the case? When this cause of waste is definitely stopped the country will realize the need to economize food, but not otherwise. One used to say with some reason : " Better a free than a sober country." Now the choice is "quite other than that." Now, iu the stress of war, it is : Shall the nation be abstemious or damned—in all three senses of that much-abused word?—I am,
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