Hast thou been long and often foiled With patience persevere; Knowing, when darkest seems the night, Art thou a Christian? shall the frown The Bruce but won an earthly crown THE WRONG ROAD.-H. W. ADAMS. "Good-by, mother; don't worry about me. I can take care of myself. I shall come back in my carriage some day, and see you all again." This was Charley Mason's self-confident farewell to his mother, as he left his native town and took the stage for the nearest railroad station, bound for the great metropolis. New York was not much like the quiet farming town where he had lived. The city, with its ten thousand sgilts and sounds, stirred his soul. To see with his own eyes the wonderful things of which his fellow-clerks told, did not accord with his conscience or his promises to the dear folks at home. But they were "slow," and "behind the age." "There can be no harm in going just once to the theatre; lots of church members go there." So over the sins of worldly church members, Charley stumbled. Hamlet was played that night. The glare of a thousand gas-lights; the gorgeous scenery; the gaily dressed, bright-faced men and women; the royal attire of the actors; the splendid tragedy, which seemed so real; the absence of anything coarse or vulgar, captivated our hero. He saw at once that all the stories about the demoralizing tendencies of the theatre were grandmas' fables, told by people who knew nothing about it. George Peterson was a grand, whole-souled fellow, a salesman in the store where Charley was employed. He had paid for the evening's entertainment, and now they were on the way home. "Let's look in here a moment, Charley." There was a sudden twinge of conscience, for that brilliantly-lighted room was a billiard hall, and Charley had never put his foot inside of such a door in his life. "All right, George, we will just look in a moment.” All eyes were centred on a match game by two of the renowned players of the metropolis. It was hotly contested. The men were equally skilful, and had kept together, almost point for point, throughout the game. The leader's hand trembled a little as he put himself in position for the last stroke. He missed, and his opponent soon won the game, amid the plaudits of his friends. Charley was more than interested; he was intensely excited by the game, and by his first taste of gay city life. Near the door where they entered was the bar, grand with gilded decanters, marble, and plate glass. The polite bar-tender handed down a decanter, as they were about to pass out. "Let's have a glass, just one, Charley!" But Charley stood irresolute. Visions of home, and mother, and sisters, flashed before him. He dared not drink, and under the pressure of the night's glare and whirl, he dared not refuse. In the afternoon he would have repelled the temptation, but twice already that night he had been tempted and yielded, and the lesser temptations were the thin end. of the wedge which opened up the way for the greater. "Don't be squeamish-you can take care of yourself, and so can I." "Well, just a glass, then." "The wine when it is red," how it sparkled; but who can picture the woe that slept in the depths of the first glass! Two years farther on. You would hardly know our innocent farmer lad in the fast young man who faces us and tips, with maudlin leer, his glass to an older comrade. Cigars, cards, and drugged brandy, with the prostrate form of his partner on the floor, tell of "a high old time," and rapid transit on the devil's road to ruin and death. And there is that which we dare not picture. There are scenes which we will not describe, and associates that we may not name, that are wasting his substance and consuming his precious life. Only twenty-five, and you would think him fifty. Exhausted, shattered, wrecked; disgusted with the cup of pleasure, which at the first was so sweet, and now is as bitter as gall. He wakes from a troubled sleep, after a debauch, to find that the deadly mania of the cup is upon him. Snakes writhe and twist themselves about his shivering form; spiders and toads crawl over him; terrible fancies and forebodings rack his soul. How he pleads with God to save him, and yet he knows that Satan has him bound hand and foot. "At the last it biteth like a serpent and stingeth like an adder." The end is not far off, but who can write it? Diseased, debauched, his nerves unstrung, his constitution broken, his bones rotted, his eyes bleared, horror and darkness settling about him, he sinks in the dire struggle, and his sun goes down at noon! Strangers look coldly on him in the dying hour, and rude, unfriendly hands convey him to the Potter's Field. Ah! how many such graves there are! and no man that lives dare go to the old home where childhood's sunny hours were spent, and tell the whole honest truth about what carried the wandering boy to his grave. No man dares to break that mother's heart with the terrible narration of the sin, and vice, and ruin which the destroyer has wrought. But in after years she comes, a worn and wearied pilgrim, gray-haired, with furrows on her care-worn face, and by that neglected grave, where thorns and briers twine and tangle themselves above the sleeping dust, that mother kneels and cries out in the bitterness of her soul, "My son! my son! would God that I had died for thee!" BAITSY AND I ARE OUDT.-GEORGE M. WARREN. Draw oop dem bapers, lawyer, und make 'em shtrong und lawful, My house vas getting oopside oudt, und Baitsy she vas awvul. Dot's no use talkin', ve can't agree-sooch aickshuns I naifer saw; To tell you der troot, between you und me, she vas vorse as a mudder-in-law. Ven I virst got married mit Baitsy, I liked her pooty vell, Dot's a ding I naifer look into mooch-you know how dot vas yourself; Und I vas a-reading 'boudt Daniel, how he shoomped in der lions' den, Und youst a leedle farder along, I vas reading dem lines den, Vere it says: "Und Daniel got hees back oop-righdt oop against der vall; Bud der lions don'd vas shkared-dey didn't done notting at all;" Und ven I read dot shapter dru, ve both vas a goot deal puzzled, Und I says, "Baitsy, now I see how t'vas, dem lions must bin muzzled,” She dold me I vas lyin', dot vas not vot it meant, I said she vas anudder, und dot's youst der vay it vent; Und den she vas got awful mad, und dold me to my vace, "I vish, py Shinks! dot Dan vas oudt, und you vas een hees blace." "Vell," I says, "I'm villings to shange mit Daniel, let heem comb und leef mit you, Und I'll go und shoomp een der lions' den, und enshoy myself better'n I do! Bud vot een der dooce vould Daniel dink ov I ashk heem to shange mit me? He would say, 'Oh, no! I know Baitsy too vell-I vould rudder shtay vere I be!"' She shoomped righdt gwick vor der broomshtick, und vas goin' to gife me a douse; Bud ven she turned roundt to shtruck me, she vas all alone in der house; Dot's der reason I comb to talk to you aboudt der varm und homeshtead; Dere moosht no vone trust Baitsy on my aggount, she left my board und bedshtead. Vone day she vanted soam vater, und dold me to go oudt und pump it, I dold her I vouldn't do it, und ov she didn't like it she could lump it! She shoked me oop against der vall, und shut my vind pipe off; I tell you I seen shtars dot time, und I dought my head vas off. Py krashus! she's liable to kill me mit vatefer she gets her hands on, Und I get mixed oop so I can't tell vich endt my head shtands on. She shtruck me vonce mit a cord-vood shtick, righdt on der shpine ov my back; I lefd her home, und vrom dot day till dees-vor dree veeks I dell you, Meesder Lawyer, it beats all vot I've endoored, Der virst time I aifer met her, I vas shtruck mit her vin ning vay; Bud now a shange vas tooken blace- I get shtruck in a deafferent vay. |