Incidents From Our Temperance Campaign in Australia
By E. M. Graham
We are having some very interesting experiences here just now in connection with the temperance work. There is to be a vote taken in New South Wales in September on the no-license question, and every adult has a right to vote, women as well as men. We are planning to circulate 100,000 temperance tracts, 100,000 copies of a special Temperance Signs, and 25,000 copies of a special temperance health magazine. This will cost $2,500, but we are planning to enlist the help of the public in raising this money. We are getting our people to take a packet of tracts and a collecting card, visit every house in certain territory assigned to them, leave a tract, and ask for donations toward the distribution of temperance literature. We tried the experiment with some of our office workers first, to see if it was workable. One girl went out, left twelve cents' worth of tracts, and collected $1.24 in two hours. Others had similar experiences, so we decided the plan would succeed. If our one thousand Sabbath-keepers collect $2.50 each, we shall get the $2,500 needed; but many of them will get much more. One young man has set his stakes for fifty dollars. We are introducing the subject to our people in conventions in churches in the center of groups of churches. Two have been held so far, with gratifying success. At Stanmore, last Sunday, every one in the meeting stood up when the question was asked, How many will help? Some incidents in connection with this work have been very interesting to us. We have been in touch with the New South Wales Alliance, and they have been pleased with our plans. Yesterday their secretary rang us up, and asked us to send some one to attend their quarterly executive meeting, as they thought that if we told them our plans, it might stir some of them up to work. So we sent our state agent to tell them of our plans. He did not arrive until three quarters of an hour after their meeting started; but as soon as he entered the room, they stopped what they were doing, and called him forward. He told them briefly what we were planning, and showed them our literature. With this they were much pleased, especially with a plan for an illustrated tract to appeal to mothers. Other speakers expressed the wish that they could get such a plan to work. They said they wanted collectors, but did not know how to get them. Then Brother Blunden asked if he might say a word or two more, and told them that we expected to put a thousand workers in the field, and that all our people, men, women, and children, stood solid on the question,—a statement that called forth warm expressions of approval. Archdeacon Boyce, chairman of the meeting, highly commended our temperance literature. After the meeting, their city organizer told Brother Blunden that none of the other ministers had been able to give them one worker, so you can see why they were so happy when they found we had one thousand available. This man said he only wished he had such an organization at his back. Two things happened yesterday which have further encouraged us. One of the sisters who took part in the Stanmore meeting on Sunday was going to the hospital to visit her husband, who is ill, and she took with her a temperance tract, a reprint of a chapter in "Ministry of Healing." When she left the train, a gentleman who had been sitting several seats behind her, said, "Excuse me, but is that a temperance tract you were reading?" She told him it was, and he replied that he had been impressed that she was reading a temperance tract which he ought to have, and asked if she was selling them. She said she was taking this to read to her husband, but that she had others which she was going to distribute, and solicit donations for the temperance work. He said he would give her sixty cents for it, so she let him have it. What encouraged us in this incident was that it was evidently the Spirit of the Lord who impressed the man to go to her, as he could not see what she was reading. The other incident happened to my assistant secretary, Miss Gregg. She had to go to the city before a meeting at Stanmore, and took some of the Alliance tracts with her to study. A lady leaned over from the seat behind, and asked if she might speak to her when she left the train. So she waited for this lady, who introduced herself as the secretary of the W. C. T. U. of one of the country towns, and asked Miss Gregg if she could tell her where she could get some good temperance literature. Miss Gregg then had a talk with her about the temperance work. She will send her literature. An interesting point in this was that this lady could have taken the train to her home from Strathfield, where she was, and where Miss Gregg boarded the train; but she felt impressed to go to the city, and take the train there, though she had to go back to Strathfield again on her way home. These things, though small in themselves, show that the Lord approves of our work, and that he is working with us. E. M. GRAHAM,
Sec. Austral. Union Conference.