out of doors by my father because I attended the chapel. My downfall was through marrying a drinking husband, not a drunkard, but a moderate drinking husband. He soon got fond of drink and became a sad drunkard. For some years we never stayed beyond a year at one place, and every move we made was for the worse. But, thank God, at last the bright star of temperance shone on our home. It brought me back to my God. No one can possibly conceive the blessed change but those who have experienced it. Drink robbed me of my religion, my home, my happiness, my husband's love; but God has made teetotalism a means of bringing them all back. If any of my sisters here have got drunken husbands, let me urge you to pray for them. Friends, I have faith in prayer. I have reason to do so. I have often found God to answer prayer, and I believe that he will answer yours."

During the address of the last speaker the meeting presented a deeply interesting spectacle-tears of gratitude were seen trickling down the cheeks of men, women, and children in every part of the room, and at the close of the appeal on behalf of "prayer," the subdued but heartfelt response which escaped from many lips, would have softened the animosity of even the most bitter opponent of the temperance cause.

After uniting in praise to God, the meeting broke up, since which time I have not ventured to retard the advocacy of the temperance cause even by females, no matter by what name they may be called.

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PREFACE.

The following pages have been written with a sincere desire to remedy an almost universal evil, which is the cause of so much misery, disease, and death.

It is the duty of medical men, as guardians of the public health, as far as possible to prevent disease, as well as to cure; prevention being better than cure.

Dr. A. Todd Thomson remarks, in his DOMESTIC MANAGEMENT OF THE SICK ROOM, "Perhaps if medical men were professionally consulted rather to obviate the tendncy to disease rather than to cure them when they are present, the sum of human happiness, as far as that depends upon health, would be greatly augmented.”

DIALOGUE.

Friend.-I AM desirous of hearing your opinion on the subject of mothers taking ale, porter, wine and spirits, to enable them to suckle their infants. The question is one of vital importance, as the welfare and happiness of succeeding generations depend upon its satisfactory answer; and I am the more anxious to inquire, as medical men are of different opinions respecting it; and "what shall we say when doctors disagree?"

Doctor.-There is an old saying, "they who live according to nature, will never be poor; but they who live according to opinion, will never be rich." It may be said with truth, that the nearer mothers follow the dictates of nature in this respect, the safer, and also the richer they will be, as the doctor will have fewer fees for attendance, both upon themselves and their children. What creature, but woman, ever required intoxicating drink for the purpose of suckling its young? Did you ever hear of anything so ridiculous as an old woman giving her cow a bucket of ale two or three times a day, to enable her to suckle her calf? The idea is preposterous. The strongest animals, such as the lioness, the tigress, the elephant, and the mare, require nothing more than water; and no other fluid is necessary for the human species.

Friend.-I have heard that intoxicating drinks enter into and mix with the mother's milk. Is that the case? Doctor.-Yes: all fluids, entering the stomach, whether intoxicating or otherwise, are taken up by the absorbent vessels, and are conveyed into the heart, mix with the blood, and pass through the circulation. From that blood the mother's milk is secreted or separated, by the glands in the breast, and alcohol, the intoxicating agent, becomes mixed with it, remaining unchanged in its nature.

Friend. Surely every intelligent mother would at once be an abstainer if she were thus convinced.

Doctor. I should think so indeed, both on her own account, and also for the sake of her infant, knowing that a poison is mixed with her milk, which deteriorates and renders it much less nutritious; indeed it makes it like the dairy-man's milk who deals in what is termed "slop still milk, which is so inferior, that it is sold at a lower price than the good milk. It is said to be so injurious to the children who feed upon it, that physicians have complained of it, and have been desirous of preventing the cows being fed on the slop from the distilleries, on account of the diseases produced by it." So that every mother should recollect that she, in a similar manner, is injuring her milk when she takes ale, porter, wine, &c., to enable her to suckle her infant; that the alcohol in these fluids passes unchanged in its nature through her whole frame, injures every fibre of the body, from the crown of the head to the soles of the feet, and that, by suckling, it is transmitted to her babe, and leaves the seeds of disease, consequently not only shortens her own life, but also the life of her offspring.

Friend. I perceive now how diseases become hereditary by taking intoxicating drinks, how they are transmitted from parent to child; and it at once explains the information I received from the governor of an extensive parochial establishment, where there resided ten or eleven hundred children, He said one-half of the children were suffering under the different symptoms of scrofula, such as consumption, rickets, white swellings, arising from the intemperance and proficacy of their parents.

Doctor. No doubt the account is quite correct, and it is a striking proof that the sins of the parents are frequently

visited upon the children. It is also an acknowledged fact, that the families of the intemperate die off and become extinct. Many of the children, whose mothers suckle by the aid of intoxicating drinks, die in infancy from diseases of the head, convulsions, water in the brain, and inflammation of the lungs. They are also more likely to sink under any epidemic disease, such as measles, small-pox, or hooping-cough, their bodies being more prepared for disease, and being less able to resist it.

Friend.-Pray are there no cases in which it may be advantageous for nursing mothers to take intoxicating drinks? A few days since, I heard a gentleman say he would on no account allow his wife to attempt to suckle her child without taking malt liquor to nourish her. He had consulted a medical man, who declared it was quite necessary, and that his own wife was in the habit of taking those stimulants for that purpose.

Doctor. The ignorance of some medical men on this particular point, appears almost as great as that of their patients. Long custom and prejudice in favour of these beverages being nutritious and strengthening, is deeply rooted in the mind; and they have also been prescribed as stomachics and tonics. Sir Astley Cooper said to a physician, a short time before his death, "We have all been mistaken-we have called these drinks stomachics and tonics, when we should have called them stimulants." He might have added, with truth, irritants. Time and experience will correct the error. There are now many ladies who have shown that they possess both sufficient physical and moral strength to adopt the abstinent plan, of suckling without such artificial and dangerous helps, and they have been rewarded for it. One of them, the wife of a professional gentleman, in London, had some conversation with me on the subject of nursing. She left off taking porter from that time. During the interval of my seeing her again, she became a mother; and on my visit about fifteen months afterwards, she introduced to my notice an infant she had nursed without taking one drop of ale or porter, or any other intoxicating liquor. She had never enjoyed better health in her life than she had during the whole time. The child had been perfectly healthy, and