How To Save The Men From Saloons

Froin Appletou's Journal. It is offei-ed as an excuse for the iecent very extraordinary proooedings against liquor-sellers, that women are pecuüarly sufferers froui intemperance among uien. The drinking shop, it is alleged, seduces husbands and sous f rom their homes, tempts them to the spending of wageg needed in their househclds, and is tho fruitful cause of vast dotnestic inisery, which falls heavily upon the women of the family. No doubt this is true. But we accuse women of being espeoially responsibile for this condition of things. We charge that men; especially young uien, are 8eduged to the drinkiug-shop beoause it possossps superior attractions to their homes. We indict women, both as mothers and wives, for such neglect of their duties that their husbands and sons have been driven abroad iu pursuit of those pleasures and felicities that women are under moral obligation to próvido in the housphold. There are soiue men so depraved by nature that no influence is powerful enough to keep them trom evil. These exceptional cases we exelude trom present eousideration. They are morally diseased, and the physjcian alono can adequately deal with them. But the average man is entirely susceptible to influences. His couduct is oertain to prove a d=finito result of training and eduoation. It is a matter of pure dynamics. If the good influences that surround him are greater than the evil ones, he will yield to-the former ; if the evil in fluences are greater than th.. good ones, he will surrender to the latter. Of course, this is just as truo of women as it is of men. But the question now before us is this : How far are women responsible for the dissipated course of. men f How is it that the society of tho dram-shop is a greater social power than that of. the hearthstone 'r1 When we hear a womau complaiu that her sons have drifted away from the dominion of ber influence ; that, while educated at her side, they have oome to pre'fer the companionship of the vicious to that of her, then we know this mother has boon unequal to the cluty ímijosed upon her. Where there are no distinctly inherited depravities, there has been souie fatal nuglcct in the homo training that ñas pormitted this deplorable result to come about. When we hear of thü husband who ceaselessly seeks for his felicities abroad, who prefers the public-house, the club, or boon companions, to tho suoiety of his family, then we avo assured that in some way the home, which ought to bo first in his affections, has failed to assert that dominion over his heart, which if rightly conduoted it would havo been sure to do. The average American interior is oppressively dreary. Men eat and sleep in their houses because it is more convenient to sleep and eat there than elsowhere ; but, beyond this, the ordinary "roof-tree" is utterly without attractions. It is without attractions, iiot so much froni neglect as froni a perverse determination that its whole econouiy shall be of the most pinched, stinted, narrow, and choerless character, such us only dull iinagination, false economy, cold sympathies, and selfish tastos, can make it. Go into our towns and villages, and seo the so-i alled homes. Watch and discover the theory under which so many of them are conducted. A window is never opened ; a door never stands ajar. During the day the glorious sun is never permitted to enter their darkened chainbers ; at night a feeblo light through a window shows how thofamily dismally burrow in a corner. Enter, and you will discover that tho house is inhospitable to the stranger, and gives no indioation that it is meant to bo eujoyed by its inmates. - ■ The parlors aro cuill with an atmosphere that rarely knovvs a human presence. Tho passages ocho tho sound of your footfall as if startled by the unusual intrusin. The womon aro gathered nthekitohen, whero tho stove-heated air and the odors of tho cuiñne are sickening and unwholosome ; and the inen are any where out of the house, - any whero to escape the the appaüing deadness that settles upon the place. In these homes, tho wotuen would i-ather their sons should idlo the day at the postoffice, the village store, or the alehouse, thau let the sunbeauis enter their parlors and fade the earpets ! They would rather theii sons and husbands should at night enjoy the good oheer of tho publichouse,'thau light an extra Candió, build a glowingflre, orpermit social hilarity within the awful shadows of their shutup apartments. In these homes the whole art is the art of not to live. To keep all things neat, and orderly, andcircumspect; to present no ttaw for the ediftcatiou of Mrs. Grundy ; to suppress all impulses, all tastes, all pleasures, all heartiness, all lite, - theso things seem to be the grbat purpose of the asuotic women who control them. It is no wonder that men escape from them, and prefer even the coarse amusemeuts of tho public house; for to lioe is the necessity of tho masculino nature, and any form of lito is botter than apathy and chili. The slovenly homo is no less potent in driving men into evil than the apathetic home, - anexperience common ainongthe lower classe9, where.the squalor and disorder of the smal! apartmeuts render home about tho last place in tho world the man can tolérate. Womon who have sons to rear, and dread the detuoralizing influences of bad associates, ought to understand the nature ot young manhood. It is exeessively restless. It is disturbed by vague ambitions, by thirst loraction, by longings for excitement, by irrepressiblo desires to touch life iu nianifold ways. If you, mothers, ear your sons so that their homes are associated with the repressionof these natural instincts, you will be suro to throw thiim into the society that in any measure can supply tho need of thuir hèarts. Thoy will not go to tho publichouse at first, for lovo of liquor, - very few people evor really like tho tasto of liquor,- thoy will go tor the animated and hilarious companionship thoy flud there, , whioh, thcy discover, does so much to rcpress the disturbing restlessness in their breasts. See to it, then, that their homes competo with public places in attraetiveness. Opun your biinds by dny, and light bright fires at night. illuminato your rooms. Hang piotuves on the walls. Put books and newspapers on your tables. - Havo ïnusic and entertaining games. - Banish those demons of dullness and apathy that have so long ruled in your household, and bring in mirth and good oheor. Invent occupations for your eons. Stifiiulate their ambitions in worthy directions. While you make home their delight, fill thcm with higher purposes than mere pleasure. Whether they shall pass happy boyhoods, and enter upon inanhood with refined tastes and noble ambitions, depends upon you. Do not blame miserable bar-koepers if your sons miscarry. Believe it possible that, with exertion and right means, a inother may have inoro control over thedestiny of her boys than any other influunco whatsoever. The influence of the vvife is ulways abridged by the facts of the early iraining of her husband. He comes to her a man with his habita forraed. A woman should be sure not to marry a man with depraved tastes : and, with good iuclinations and correct habits at the beginning of married lito, a wife must havo a very weak hold upon her husband if sho suffer him to slip awaj into dissipation. In these cases, we can suspect either cooled affection, bad temper, dreary companionship, or something in the admiuistration of the domestic lite whereby the man ceases to find pleasure in his home. It will bo asked if men, too, are not responsible for the felicities of home. Assuredly. They must bring to it generous spirit, affectionate regard; kindly temper, sympathetic appreci&tion. But, in a large majority of insiances, the torpor of the wife: her pinched economies; her fondness for negative lito, rest and quiet : her distaste for all topics outside of domestic ones ; her inability ta feel interest in the doings of the world ; her general lack of intelloctual activity - sho may be as inlellectnal, strictly speaking, as her 'husband, but sho will be interested in a much uarrower range of subjects - it is these thmgs that give to the average family cirelo its deadness and dullness. Women are content with a calm, oolorless lite, vvhilo men want stiuiulating society,' and, unless women cm oomprehend this masculino need, they will fail.to exercise that influence which, rightfnlly understood, might be made supremo.So we say to these crusading women : Return to your homes ! Soorn the thought that you cannot make your housKholds more delightful than bar-rooms. Banish your narro w asceticism, Make your religión a source of oheerfulness, and not of gloom. Convert your honses into temples of innocent pleasure Be bright and stimulating compauions for your hus bands and sons. Understand at onco that badly-kept homos have drivon more men iuto irregular! ties than anything else, - and upou you mainly rests the responsibility for the evils thus arising. We are not asserting that intemperance yould end with the change in the policy of women that we have proposod. Intemperance often comes of causes too subtle for human analysis. Bat it is asserted that intemperance ia promoted by dram-shops ; and it is thü influence, this cause of intemperance, that women are entirely competent to remove, by seeing that the hearthstone sball be inore seductivo than the ale-house.