On Thursday, Lord Salisbury made a short speech to the
Wavertree Conservative Working-Men's Club, in which he dealt very amusingly with the charge which had been made by the temperance party that the political working-men's dabs are the causes of a great deal of intemperance. He had even heard, he said, that a young man belonging to one of them had been Been to lunch on bread and cheese and beer. "I feel," he said, "the appalling responsibility of supporting an institution which may lead a young man to lunch on bread and cheese and beer. My impression is that if the subjects of her Majesty, to what- ever club they belong, never do anything worse than consume bread and cheese and beer, our record among nations will stand remarkably high ;" and even the consumption of beer would, Lord Salisbury thought, be more moderate, if it took place among those companions to whom a man looks up for political stimulus and instruction, than it might be outside the range of any such criticism. The truth is, no doubt, that there are no more intemperate critics of human life than many of the apostles of temperance. Indeed, it takes an enthusiast to preach temper- ance, and from enthusiasm to fanaticism is an easy step.
