resent in actual results is a matter of opinion. Some think the difference would be enormous. I cannot agree with them. One thing is certain. No system will prevent people getting drunk on the premises. The Bolag, with ample powers and the best will in the world, certainly does not. I have seen a man tumble out of one of their shops and go staggering down the street; I have seen others served who had obviously had too much already, and, though not 'drunk and incapable' at the moment, would undoubtedly be so within five minutes of their getting outside. And was not one of our model public-houses convicted of serving a drunken man a few days after it was opened? On the whole, I should say a decent English publican is stricter than a Bolag manager, because a drunken man is more likely to get him into trouble by stopping and making a noise. As for pushing the sale,' I have already discussed that dear delusion, and will merely observe that the Bolag manager attends more promptly to his customers than any English publican I ever saw. Finally, there is the question of early closing, and this appears to me by far the most important and efficient difference between the English and the Gothenburg public-house. The strongest argument for the Scandinavian system is that it is the easiest and most complete way of controlling the hours. On this head it should be observed that the Swedish law places great power in the hands of the local authority apart from the system altogether. The legal hour for closing is ten, but it may be advanced or retarded by the town

authorities at pleasure. Thus in Gothenburg all public-houses close at eight, hotels and restaurants at twelve, while the Bolag shuts its bars at six or seven. Of course, this obviously means one law for the rich and another for the poor, and results in some curious anomalies. For instance, in one of the Bolag establishments the poor man on the ground floor cannot drink at the bar after six and is turned out at eight, while his social superior can have what he pleases up till eleven in a room above. The contrast was forcibly impressed upon me once by a young gentleman who with great gravity and a glazed eye explained to me the advantages of the Gothenburg system as well as a thickened utterance would permit. To my description of some drunken men I had seen that evening he replied sympathetically Bajjob!' which is not Swedish but drunkenese for 'Bad job!' I left him at 11.30 P.M. still opening fresh bottles in the restaurant of an hotel which is nominally under the control of the Bolag. The docile and submissive Swedish working man does not kick against the invidious distinction, but how would the free-born Briton take it? However, so great a discrepancy would not be necessary. Bars might very well be closed an hour earlier than restaurants and hotels without exciting class prejudices. Of course this could also be done by statutory legislation, but the prospect is not very promising. Under the company system it would be a matter of course.

It only remains to add that the lessons derived from other considerable towns in Sweden and Norway

are substantially the same. The profits of the traffic are somewhat differently distributed, a much larger share going to the State in Norway, but the net results may be summarised as general improvement in the traffic, diminished consumption of spirits, and a large amount of drunkenness with a tendency to increase. The average annual figures for drunkenness (that is, number of convictions per 1,000) in recent years are-Stockholm, 33; Bergen, 26; Christiania, 56. Christiania is quite as drunken as Gothenburg or Glasgow, and even Bergen is far more drunken than the worst town in England.

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CHAPTER XII

HABITUAL INEBRIATES

THE Legislature has wisely proceeded by slow steps in trying to deal with this painful class. They present a most perplexing problem-so perplexing that one's mind involuntarily reverts to the Old Eccles system of hastening the end by providing opportunities for unlimited indulgence; but, however diverting or sensible that treatment may be in a play, it cannot be advocated in seriousness. Neither the individual nor the State can shirk the duty of doing what they can for these wrecks of humanity. What can they do?

It is now generally recognised that the first essential is to keep them entirely from drink, and all those who have had any experience of inebriates know that this cannot be done under the ordinary conditions of life even when the patient is most willing to co-operate. Hence the invention of homes, retreats, and reformatories, which are intended to make abstinence effective for a given period. Homes or retreats are for voluntary patients; reformatories for persons committed by magistrates on conviction in court. The former were established on a legal

footing under license by the Act of 1879; the latter by the Act of 1898. Or, more correctly, legal machinery for establishing them was provided by those Acts. We have, therefore, more than twenty years' experience of licensed retreats, but public reformatories have existed for a very short time, and only on a small scale, as local authorities have not been in a hurry to avail themselves of the power to set up such institutions given by the Act of 1898. According to the Government inspector's last report there were at the end of 1900 twenty licensed retreats with 357 beds, and five reformatories with 416 beds. Both have since increased and will no doubt continue to increase, for the desire to make use of them and the consequent demand for accommodation seem to be growing steadily.

A good deal of disappointment at the small results of the Act of 1898 has been expressed by advocates of reformatory treatment, and local authorities have been blamed for not utilising their powers on a larger scale. It is said that the Act has made no perceptible difference. That is true; it has not; but the local authorities are not to blame. I read in the Government report that at the end of July 1901 there were 428 beds available for committed cases, of which 285 were occupied. The accommodation, though not very large, was then in excess of the demand. This does not mean that there were in England and Wales only 285 persons proper subjects for reformatory treatment, because more than two-thirds of the local authorities-county