Theodore P. Wilson

“ O Frank, I have dreadful misgivings. Miserable rumours come across the sea to make all our hearts sick. Will you not at once and for ever renounce what has been the occasion of sin and disgrace to yourself and of misery to us both? Will you not go to the Strong for strength, and cast yourself at once on him? I cannot write more now, for I am almost broken-hearted. I shall not cease to pray for you.—Yours, Mary Oliphant. ”

“ There are impressions cut deeper into the heart by the sudden stroke of some special trial than any made by the continuous pressure of afflictions, however heavy; impressions which nothing in this world can efface—wounds, like the three-cornered thrust of the bayonet, which will not heal up. Such was the keen, piercing sorrow which the sight of Frank in his drunkenness had stabbed deep into the soul of Mary Oliphant. The wound it had made would never heal. Oh, miserable drink! which turns the bright, the noble, the intellectual creatures of God into worse than madmen ”

“ Ah, it is easy to laugh down, or press down by a mother’s authority, the holy resolve of a child who sees the gigantic monster drunkenness in some of his hideous proportions, and would gladly take that step which would keep him, if leaning on grace for strength, free from the deadly snare; easy to laugh down or crush down that resolve; but oh, impossible to recall the past, impossible to give back to the utterly hardened drunkard his fresh vigorous intellect, his nervous moral power, his unstrained will, his unwarped conscience, his high and holy resolution! ”

“ Captain Merryweather had proved himself all that a captain should be—a thorough sailor, equal to any emergency; a firm but considerate commander; an interesting and lively companion, ever evenly cheerful, and watchful to make all around him comfortable and happy. Hubert Oliphant was full of spirits—happy himself, and anxious to make others the same; a keen observer of every natural phenomenon, and admirer of the varied beauties of ocean and sky; and, better still, with a heart ready to feel the bounty and love of God in everything bright, lovely, and grand. Poor Frank had become less sad ”

“ Johnson returned from the pit, from whence he was summoned, to find his wife dead, destroyed by her own hand; and Betty utterly prostrate on her bed with the terrible and agonising shock.
Oh, drink, drink! most heartless of all fiendish destroyers, thou dost kill thy victims with a smile, plucking away from them every stay and support that keeps them from the pit of destruction; robbing them of every comfort, while hugging them in an embrace which promises delight, and yet crushes out the life-blood both of body and soul ”

“ Some wring their hands over bodies which can never live again till the resurrection morning; some lovingly tend those who lie racked with agony on their beds, every limb writhing with fiery anguish; while some poor victims are so scorched and blackened that none can be found to claim them—one can only be known by his watch-chain, so completely is he burnt out of all remembrance. And what of poor Johnson? Hour after hour Betty and her mother watched near the pit’s mouth, sick with sorrow and suspense, pressing forward as each fresh tub-load landed its miserable burden, still to be disappointed ”

“ I am no longer a child. I am not acting in the dark. I see what is my duty. I see that to exceed moderation is a sin. I have had my fall and my warnings, and to be forewarned is to be forearmed. Trust me, dear Mary—trust me without a pledge, trust me without total abstinence. You shall not have cause to blush for me again. Believe me, I love you too well.”
And with this she was forced to be content. Alas! poor Frank; he little knew the grasp which the insidious taste for strong drink had fixed upon him. ”

“ I want nothing stronger.”
Alice slipped down again to her companions below, but her daughter remained in the chamber.
It was a desolate room, as desolate as poverty and drink could make it; and now it looked doubly desolate, as the scorched figure of the old collier lay motionless on the low, comfortless, curtainless bed. A dip in an old wine bottle standing on a box threw a gloomy light on the disfigured features, which looked almost unearthly in the clear moonlight which struggled with the miserable twinkling of the feeble candle, and fell just across the bed. ”

“ Never was there a more willing learner or trustworthy servant—his was the service of love; and every day bound him more and more firmly to his young master with the cords of devoted affection. Frank returned the attachment with all the natural warmth of his character. He delighted in the rough openness, which never degenerated into rudeness or disrespect; for Jacob, while free and unconstrained in his manner, instinctively knew his place and kept it. ”

“ I sold your nuggets—I spent part of the money in drink—I played again—I’ve lost all—I shall never be able to repay you—I dare not look you in the face—I dare not look my father and mother in the face—I dare not look—it’s no matter. You are an honest fellow, Jacob, and will get on, spite of my villainy. If you ever marry and have children, make them total abstainers, if you would keep them safe in body and soul. As for myself, I cannot mend—I’m past it—I’ve been cheating myself with the belief that I meant to mend, but I never did. ”

“ I thought as I’d try and get through the world without heart at all—but it wasn’t to be. The captain found a soft place in my heart, and I loved him. But that were nothing at all to the love I’ve had to yourself, Mayster Frank. I loved you afore you saved my life, and I’ve loved you better nor my own life ever since you saved it. And oh, I can’t abide to see you throw away health and strength, and your good name and all, for the sake of that wretched drink as’ll bring you to misery and beggary and shame. Oh, don’t—dear mayster, don’t—don’t keep the horrid poison in your house. ”

“ I do not justify myself. I do not attempt to make less of the fault. I can thoroughly understand her horror, her disgust. I loathe myself as a vile beast, and worse than a beast. But yet, can I by this one act have cut through every cord that bound her heart to mine?”
“Excuse me, dear Frank,” said the other; “but you mistake in speaking of one transgression—one act. It is because poor Mary feels, as I feel too, that this act must be only one of many acts of the like kind, though the rest may have been concealed from us, that she dare not trust her happiness in your keeping.” ”

“ Alas! what will not the love of the drink, the slavery of the drink, the tyranny of the drink accomplish? Each holds his cards characteristically. Frank so carelessly that his adversary can see them; Juniper grasping and shading his with jealous vigilance, lest a single glimpse of them should be visible to his opponent. A large spirit-flask stands under the berth close by Juniper’s hand, and a glass is within the reach of each. They play on, for a while, in silence. ”

“ I dare not run the terrible risk. I dare not join myself to you in a bond which could never be severed, however aggravated might be my misery and your sin. Oh, Frank, my heart is well nigh broken! I have loved you, and do love you still. Let us be one in heaven, though we never can be so here. Pray, oh, pray for grace to resist your temptation! Ask to be made a true follower of the Lord Jesus, and you will be guided aright, and we shall meet then in that bright land where all shall rejoice together who have, by grace, fought the fight and won the victory here.—Sincerely yours, Mary Oliphant. ”

“ I know that you can do without the drink if you’ve a mind. I know you’ll be all the better by being without it. I know, and you know yourself, that it’s swallowed up the clothes from your own back, and starved and beggared us all. If you’ll give it up, and live without it like a Christian woman should, you’ll never have an afterthought; and as soon as I see that you can be trusted with the brass, I’ll give it you again with all my heart. Come, Alice, there’s a good wench; you mustn’t think me hard. I’ve been a hard husband, and fayther too, for years, but I must be different now ”

“ Ay, shame to them, indeed! But oh, how sad, how grievous that the young hand, which might have raised to untainted lips none but those pure draughts which neither heat the brain nor warp the sense of right, should ever learn to grasp the cup that gives a passing brightness to the eye and glitter to the tongue, but clouds at length the intellect, fires the brain, and leaves a multitude of wretched victims cast ashore as shattered moral wrecks. To such results, though from the smallest beginnings, does the drink tend in its very nature. Oh, happy they who are altogether free from its toils! ”

“ Frank and Hubert stood near, enjoying the lovely evening, and watching Captain Merryweather and the boy.
“Steady, my lad, steady,” said the captain; “keep her head just south and by east. A firm hand, a steady eye, and a sound heart; there’s no good without them.”
“You’ll soon make a good sailor of him, captain,” said Hubert.
“Ay, I hope so,” was the reply. “He’s got the best guarantee for the firm hand and the steady eye in his total abstinence; and I hope he has the sound heart too.”
“You look, captain, as if total abstinence had thriven with you. Have you always been a total abstainer?” ”

“ Frank, still beautiful in the refined cast of features, out of which intemperance has not yet been able to sear the traces of gentle blood and early culture; bright too and graceful in the masses of rich chestnut hair which adorn a forehead high and noble, yet now, alas! often crossed by lines of weary, premature care. Juniper, a compound of cat, fox, monkey, wolf—every feature of his contemptible face instinct with the greediest, most self-satisfied cunning. ”

“ Mr Oliphant hid his head in his hands, and groaned aloud. He had never before conceived it possible—what he now found to be too true—that long habits of drunkenness can so utterly unhumanise a man as to reduce him to a mere callous self, looking upon all things outside self as dreamy and devoid of interest, with but one passion left—the passion for the poison which has ruined him.
At last the rector raised his head, and said slowly and solemnly,—
“And if God spares you, will you not strive to lead a new life? Will you not pray for grace to conquer your besetting sin?” ”

“ Are you really trying to live the life you purposed to live? There are very ugly rumours abroad. You seem to have nearly forsaken old friends; and the new ones, if report says true, are such as will only lead you to ruin. Oh, dear Frank, if you would only see things in the right light—if you would only see your own weakness, and seek strength in prayer in your Saviour’s name—oh, surely you would break off at once from your present ways and companions, and there might be hope—oh yes, hope even yet. ”

“ And sorrow has not made her selfish. She has learned to take a deepening interest in the happiness of others; and thus, in her self-denying works of faith and labours of love, she finds the throbbings of her wounded spirit to beat less fiercely. She has gained all she hopes for in this life, peace—not in gloomy seclusion, but in holy activity—and she knows that there is joy for her laid up in that bright, eternal land where the sorrows of the past can cast no shadows on present glory. ”

“ I have no need to look at any with misgiving lest their bright faces should owe their brightness to excess in intoxicating liquors. We have no false stimulants here—we have no clouded brains, no aching consciences here—none will go home needing to rue the gathering and recreations of this day. And now, young people of the ‘Band of Hope,’ my dear boys and girls, I have just a parting word for you. Never let any one persuade you, go where you may, to forsake your pledged total abstinence. Never care for a laugh or a frown, they can do you no harm while God is on your side. ”

“ Her only hope now was in Betty; she would speak her fair, and see if she could not so work upon her feelings as to induce her to give her part of her own wages.
“Betty,” she said, softly and sadly, “you’re all the wenches I have; ay, and all the childer too, for our Sammul’s as good as dead and gone, we shall never see him no more—ah, he was a good lad to his poor mother; he’d never have grudged her the brass to buy a drop of drink. You’ll not do as your father’s doing—break your old mother’s heart, and let her waste and die out for want of a drop of drink.” ”

“ She all life, a creature of the present, and yet still more of the future, as bright with the sunshine of a hope that could never die; and they, those mouldering stones, that broken tracery, those mossy arches, sad in the desolation of the present, sadder still in the memories of an unenlightened past. Frank finished his sketch, and, holding it behind him, stole gently up to the side of Mary Oliphant. ”

“ But the past cannot be recalled, and a sorrow lies heavy on her heart which must go with her to her grave; and oh, there is a peculiar bitterness in that sorrow when she reflects what her poor boy might have been had she never herself broken down his resolve to renounce entirely that drink which proved his after-ruin. And what of the Oliphants at the Rectory? Bernard Oliphant still keeps on his holy course, receiving and scattering light. Hubert is abroad and prospers, beloved by all who know him.
And Mary, poor Mary, she carries a sorrow which medicine can never heal. ”

“ Some of those brought up are quite dead, poor blackened corpses; others still live, and are borne home, moaning piteously. From the limbs of many the skin peels with a touch. Some, less terribly injured, run and leap like madmen when they reach the open fresh air; some come up utterly blinded. And oh, what a vale of tears is that village of Langhurst the livelong night! ”