The Ethics of Drink and Other Social Questions; Or, Joints In Our Social Armour. James Runciman
and lulled man who causes all the indescribable trouble thinks that everything is as it should be. The Drink mask is a very scaring thing; once you watch it being slowly fitted on to a beautiful and spiritual face you do not care over-much about the revenue.
And now the famous Russian's question comes up: What shall we do? Well, so far as the wastrel poor are concerned, I should say, "Catch them when young, and send them out of England so long as there is any place abroad where their labour is sought." I should say so, because there is not a shadow of a chance for them in this country: they will go in their turn to drink as surely as they go to death. As to the vagabond poor whom we have with us now I have no hope for them; we must wait until death weeds them out, for we can do nothing with them nor for them.
Among the classes who are better off from the worldly point of view, we shall have sacrifices offered to the fiend from time to time. Drink has wound like some ubiquitous fungus round and round the tissues of the national body, and we are sure to have a nasty growth striking out at intervals. It tears the heart-strings when we see the brave, the brilliant, the merry, the wise, sinking under the evil clement in our appalling dual nature, and we feel, with something like despair, that we cannot be altogether delivered from the scourge yet awhile. I have stabs of conscience when I call to mind all I have seen and remember how little I have done, and I can only hope, in a shame-faced way, that the use of intoxicants may be quietly dropped, just as the practice of gambling, and the habit of drinking heavy, sweet wines, have passed away from the exclusive society in which cards used to form the main diversion. Frankly speaking, I have seen the degradation, the abomination, and the measureless force of Drink so near at hand that I am not sanguine. I can take care of myself, but I am never really sure about many other people, and I had good reason for not being sure of myself. One thing is certain, and that is that the creeping enemy is sure to attack the very last man or woman whom you would expect to see attacked. When the first symptoms are seen, the stricken one should be delivered from ennui as much as possible, and then some friend should tell, in dull, dry style, the slow horror of the drop to the Pit. Fear will be effective when nothing else will. Many are stronger than I am and can help more. By the memory of broken hearts, by the fruitless prayers of mothers and sorrowing wives, for the sake of the children who are forced to stay on earth in a living death, I ask the strong to help us all. Blighted lives, wrecked intellects, wasted brilliancy, poisoned morality, rotted will—all these mark the road that the King of Evils takes in his darksome progress. Out of the depths I have called for aid and received it, and now I ask aid for others, and I shall not be denied.
October, 1889.
VOYAGING AT SEA
A philosopher has described the active life of man as a continuous effort to forget the facts of his own existence. It is vain to pin such philosophers to a definite meaning; but I think the writer meant vaguely to hint in a lofty way that the human mind incessantly longs for change. We all crave to be something that we are not; we all wish to know the facts concerning states of existence other than our own; and it is this craving curiosity that produces every form of social and spiritual activity. Yet, with all this restless desire, this uneasy yearning, only a few of us are ever able to pass beyond one piteously narrow sphere, and we rest in blank ignorance of the existence that goes on without the bounds of our tiny domain. How many people know that by simply going on board a ship and sailing for a couple of days they would pass practically into another moral world, and change their mental as well as their bodily habits? I have been moved to these reflections by observing the vast amount of nautical literature which appears during the holiday season, and by seeing the complete ignorance and misconception which are palmed off upon the public. It is a fact that only a few English people know anything about the mightiest of God's works. To them life on the ocean is represented by a series of phrases which seem to have been transplanted from copy-books. They speak of "the bounding main," "the raging billows," "seas mountains high," "the breath of the gale," "the seething breakers," and so on; but regarding the commonplace, quiet everyday life at sea they know nothing. Strangely enough, only Mr. Clark Russell has attempted to give in literary form a vivid, veracious account of sea-life, and his thrice-noble books are far too little known, so that the strongest maritime nation in the whole world is ignorant of vital facts concerning the men who make her prosperity. Let any one who is well informed enter a theatre when a nautical drama is presented; he will find the most ridiculous spectacle that the mind of man can conceive. On one occasion, when a cat came on to the stage at Drury Lane and ran across the heaving billows of the canvas ocean, the audience roared with laughter; but to the judicious critic the real cause for mirth was the behaviour of the nautical persons who figured in the drama. The same ignorance holds everywhere. Seamen scarcely ever think of describing their life to people on shore, and the majority of landsmen regard a sea-voyage as a dull affair, to be begun with regret and ended with joy. Dull! Alas, it is dull for people who have dim eyes and commonplace minds; but for the man who has learned to gaze aright at the Creator's works there is not a heavy minute from the time when the dawn trembles in the gray sky until the hour when, with stars and sea-winds in her raiment, night sinks on the sea. Dull! As well describe the rush of the turbulent Strand or the populous splendour of Regent Street by that word! I have always held that a man cannot be considered as educated if he is unable to wait an hour in a railway-station for a train without ennui. What is education good for if it does not give us resources which may enable us to gather delight or instruction from every sight and sound that may fall on our nerves? The most melancholy spectacle in the world is presented by the stolid citizen who yawns over his Bradshaw while the swift panoramas of Charing Cross or Euston are gliding by him. Men who are rightly constituted find delight in the very quietude and isolation of sea-life; they know how to derive pure entertainment from the pageant of the sky and the music of winds and waters, and they experience a piquant delight by reason of the contrast between the loneliness of the sea and the eager struggling life of the City. Proceeding, as is my custom, by examples, I shall give precise descriptions of specimen days which anybody may spend on the wandering wastes of the ocean. "All things pertaining to the life of man are of interest to me," said the Roman; and he showed his wisdom by that saying.
Dawn. Along the water-line a pale leaden streak appears, and little tremulous ripples of gray run gently upwards, until a broad band of mingled white and scarlet shines with cold radiance. The mystery of the sea is suddenly removed, and we can watch the strange serpentine belts that twine and glitter all round from our vessel to the horizon. The light is strong before the sun appears; and perhaps that brooding hour, when Nature seems to be turning in her sleep, is the best of the whole day. The dew lies thickly on deck, and the chill of the night hangs in the air; but soon a red arc looms up gorgeously at the sea-line; long rays spread out like a sheaf of splendid swords on the blue; there is, as it were, a wild dance of colour in the noble vault, where cold green and pink and crimson wind and flush and softly glide in mystic mazes; and then—the sun! The great flaming disc seems to poise for a little, and all around it—pierced here and there by the steely rays—the clouds hang like tossing scarlet plumes.
Like a warrior-angel sped
On a mighty mission,
Light and life about him shed—
A transcendent vision!
Mailed in gold and fire he stands,
And, with splendours shaken,
Bids the slumbering seas and lands
Quicken and awaken.
Day is on us. Dreams are dumb,
Thought has light for neighbour;
Room! The rival giants come—
Lo, the Sun and Labour!
After witnessing that lordly spectacle, who can wonder at Zoroaster? As the lights from east and west meet and mingle, and the sky rears its blue immensity, it is hard to look on for very gladness.
I shall suppose that we are on a small vessel—for, if we sail in a liner, or even in an ordinary big steamer, it is somewhat like moving about on a floating factory.