A great firm of manufacturers offered tobacco at cost price; the
tobacco was carried by rail from Bristol to London; it was then sent to
Ostend, whence a cruiser belonging to the Mission cleared it out, and it
was carried to the banks and distributed among the fleets. A fisherman
could buy this tobacco at a shilling per pound. The copers were
undersold, and they found it best to take themselves off. No one can
better appreciate this most dashingly beneficial action than the
smack-owners, for their men are more efficient and honest; the fishermen
themselves are grateful, because few of them really craved after drink,
and the general results are obvious to anybody who spends a month in the
North Sea. We know the Six Governments most intimately concerned have
seen the wisdom of this action, and one of the best of modern reforms
has been consummated. The copers did a great amount of mischief
indirectly, apart from the traffic in spirits. If some of our reformers
at home could only see the prints and pictures and models which were
offered for sale, they would own, I fancy, that if the Mission had done
no more than abolish the traffic in literary and other abominations, it
has done much. A few somewhat particular folk object to supplying the
men with cheap tobacco, but any who knows what intense relief is given
to an overworked man by the pipe will hardly heed the objection much.
After a heavy spell of work, a seaman smokes for a few minutes before
the slumberous lethargy creeps round his limbs, and he is all the better
for the harmless narcotic.
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