country. The same middle class which is envenomed by the gambling
madness is also the heir of all the more vile habits which the
aristocrats have abandoned. Drinking--conviviality I think they call
it--is not merely an excrescence on the life of the middle class--it
_is_ the life; and work, thought, study, seemly conduct, are now the
excrescences. Drink first, gambling second, lubricity third--those are
the chief interests of the young men, and I cannot say that the
interests of mature and elderly men differ very much from those of the
fledglings. Ladies and gentlemen who dwell in quiet refinement can
hardly know the scenes amid which our middle-class lad passes the span
of his most impressionable days. I have watched the men at all times and
in all kinds of places; every town of importance is very well known to
me, and the same abomination is steadily destroying the higher life in
all. The Chancellors of the Exchequer gaily repeat the significant
figures which give the revenue from alcohol; the optimist says that
times are mending; the comfortable gentry who mount the pulpits do not
generally care to ruffle the fine dames by talking about unpleasant
things--and all the while the curse is gaining, and the betting,
scoffing, degraded crew of drinkers are sliding merrily to destruction.
Some are able to keep on the slide longer than others, but I have seen
scores--hundreds--stop miserably, and the very faces of the condemned
men, with the last embruted look on them, are before me. My subject has
so many thousands of facets that I am compelled to select a few of the
most striking. Take one scene through which I sat not very long ago, and
then you may understand how far the coming regenerator will have to go.
A great room was filled by about 350 men and lads, all of the middle
class; a concert was going on, and I was a little curious to know the
kind of entertainment which the well-dressed company liked. Of course
there was drink in plenty, and the staff of waiters had a busy time; a
loud crash of talk went on between the songs, and, as the drink gathered