The first Temperance Society organized in this country, in the year
1808, provided that "No member shall be intoxicated under a penalty of
fifty cents, and no member shall ask another person to take a drink
under a penalty of twenty-five cents."
There was a Temperance Society in the State of Maine, prior to the year
1825, which had the following remarkable plank in its platform: "If any
member of this Society shall get drunk, he shall be obliged to stand
treat for the whole Society all round!"
A hundred years ago the virtues of rum were set forth in an English
publication after the following fashion:
"It sloweth age, it strengthened youth, it helpeth digestion, it cutteth
phlegme, it abandoneth melancholy, it relisheth the heart, it lighteneth
the mind, it quickeneth the spirits, it cureth the hydupsia, it healeth
the strangurie, it pounceth the stone, it expelleth the gravel, it
puffeth away ventosity; it keepeth and preserveth the head from
whirling, the tongue from lisping, the mouth from snaffling, the teeth
from chattering and the throat from rattling. It keepeth the weasen from
stiffling, the stomach from wambling and the heart from swelling. It
keepeth the hands from shivering, the sinews from shrinking, the veins
from crumbling, the bones from aching, and the marrow from soaking."
"THE ---- YANKEES"
When Sherman's army was making its great march through Georgia the
colored people were, of course, very much excited over the news of the
approach of the Northern army. They had very little idea of what
Northern soldiers looked like, but had commonly heard them spoken of as
"the dam Yankees." In a certain part of Georgia, when they heard of the
approach of the great army, the darkies held a prayer-meeting, and one
old fellow prayed--"O Lawd, bress Massa Linkum, an' bress Gin'l Sherman.
O Lawd, he's one o' us. He got a white skin, but he got a black heart,
he one o' us. An', O Lawd, bress all dem dam Yankees!"