- { The [Price of a License »
Wauar's the price of a license? How much
did you say?
The price of men’s souls in the market to-
day?
A license to sell, to deform, and destroy,
From the gray hairs of age to the innocent
boy —
How much did you say?
How much is to pay?
your gold?
A license to poison —a crime oft retold —
Fix a price on the years and the manhood
of man;
Take what is not yours to destroy if you
can —
What's the price, did you say?
How compare with
How much for a license?
crimes
Men are caused to commit when besotted at
times?
To take character, reason foredoomed to the
grave,
And give men your curses when pity cries,
“Save!”
What's the price, did you say?
How reckon the
How much for a license?
of the home;
Of the tears that are shed in its anguish and
gloom;
Count the price
THE WATCHMAN
Count the happiness lost on the vote that you
gave
When you voted the license that made man a
slave —
What price was to pay?
How much for a license? Count the price
of her life
Whom your children called mother, and whom
you called wife,
Who died of her grief, heart broken away,
That her home was left bare of its bread day
by day —
The license to pay.
How much to pay? , Count the price of one
soul,
Multiplied by names on eternity’s scroll,
Of those who have gone, once in manhood’s
strong pride;
Then add those who with them have suffered
and died —
What's the price, did you say?
How much is to pay? You count out the
gold,
But the price to be paid has never been told;
Count the measure you mete out your neigh-
bor to-day,
To be meted you back —but in God's time
and way —
"T'is a debt you must pay!
— Mrs. S. A. Gordon.
BOYS, CIGARETTES, DOCTORS
HE London Sunday School
Chronicle, through a repre-
sentative, asked several phy-
sicians what they had to say
about the effect of cigar-
ettes upon young smokers.
He reports: “The follow-
ing gentlemen courteously
made an appointment, and I reproduce
the notes of our conversation without
comment, leaving the facts to make their
own impression.
“Dr. W. J. Burroughs, physician and
surgeon, explained to me that he at-
tended among the poor in the neighbor-
hood, and had every opportunity of ob-
serving what was going on. Nearly
every little boy in Somers Town smoked.
They began when they were very tiny
boys indeed ; and, with a few exceptions,
they were stunted in growth. This was
doubtless due to a variety of causes, such
as insufficient food in hard times, and
improper food at other times, but unques-
tionably cigarette smoking was a most
important factor in retarding their
growth. It interfered with digestion
and the vital processes generally.
“ He had many cases of illness among
small boys, in which he was convinced
that smoking was the cause; but it was
seldom possible to obtain a confession
that they had been smoking. They were
mostly brought to his consulting-room by
their fathers or their mothers, and even
when the parent was out of the room,
they were afraid to confess, lest the doc-
tor should tell their parents.
The juvenile smoker very often did not
come under medical observation till he
was about eighteen, when the mischief
was done. He had noticed in his prac-
tice that heart irregularity was much
more prevalent among lads of this age
than it used to be, and this he largely at-
tributed to juvenile smoking. His ex-
perience led him to believe that phthisis
was often caused by juvenile smoking.
Defective vision was much commoner
among boys than it used to be. There
were various causes at work; but he
considered juvenile smoking the most po-
103
tent of these. The tobacco acted di- -
rectly on the optic nerve.
“Dr. T. G. Simpson gave a typical
case of a boy of eleven who had been
ill from the effects of persistent
He was suffering
indigestion, depression of the
heart’s action, and enfeeblement of the
brain arising from the effects of the to-
bacco on the nervous system. ‘He
could not remember anything; and his
parents thought he was getting stupid.
I was convinced that smoking was the
root of the mischief. I gave him a good
talking to, and so did his mother. He
gave up smoking, and his digestion was
improved, and his memory is all right
again.
very
cigarette smoking.
from
I have had many similar cases.
“ ‘Another recent patient whose illness
was due to the cigarette habit was a boy
of fourteen. He was suffering from
sickness and giddiness. His mother
thought that his illness was due to bath-
ing. His tongue was coated, and the
peculiarly depressed state of the heart
and nerves led me to suspect smoking.
The boy, on being pressed, admitted that
he had been smoking cheap cigarettes
— eight or ten a penny — that are made
of strong, rank, American tobacco, and
are much more hurtful in their effect
than a milder tobacco.
“‘I have,” Dr. Simpson continued,
“had frequent cases of boys from sixteen
to seventeen, who have smoked for sev-
eral years, showing physical weakness
of the lungs and heart. I had one case
quite recently of a lad of seventeen, who
had been smoking from about thirteen
or fourteen. He was suffering from
hemorrhage from the lungs, and show-
ing premonitory symptoms of phthisis.
His mother told me of his heavy smok-
ing, and I warned him of the very serious
risk he was running. He stopped the
habit and was sent to the country. His
health was improved; but he is still far
from strong. Certainly he will never
be the lad he might have Been. He came
of a good, healthy stock. The girls of
the family are all the pictures of health,
and big for their age.
““The habit of juvenile smoking is
very prevalent in the Fast End, and I do
my level best to stop it. Whenever I get
the chance, on the top of a ’bus or any-
where else, I always warn growing boys
whom I find smoking, of the mischief
they are doing to their growing heart
and their growing nervous system.’ ”