From Wealth to Poverty; Or, the Tricks of the Traffic. A Story of the Drink CursePotter, Austin
General
From Wealth to Poverty; Or, the Tricks of the Traffic. A Story of the Drink Curse
Potter, Austin
Temperance -- Fiction
Luella Sealy was taken to her room that night a raving maniac. The
sight of any member of her family made her furious; and she
accused them in the fiercest tones of murdering her darling
William. After awhile she became more calm, seeming to be quietly
slumbering, and, under the circumstances, they thought it would be
safe to leave her for a short time. Her father, acting upon this
idea, left her alone for a few moments while he went to call his
daughter-in-law to come and remain with her; but when he returned
to her room she was gone. In a moment all was excitement, and
every part of the house was searched, but she could not be found.
As, however, they ran round the varanda they found her under the
window, on the spot where William Barton had been murdered, lying
cold and dead, with a ghastly gash in her neck, and her white
garments dyed red with her life-blood. A razor, the instrument
with which she had accomplished her self-destruction, was
clutched, with the grip of death, in her red right hand.
Ginsling was tried for the murder of Barton; but as John, jun.,
swore the latter was about to enter the house to attack him, and,
therefore, the shot was fired in self-defense, he got off with a
short imprisonment. But after leaving the jail he found that it
would be neither agreeable nor safe for him to reside longer in
Bayton, as almost all of the inhabitants shunned him, and the
friends of Barton vowed vengeance against him. He accordingly left
to reside in the town of M----. He did not live long after
leaving Bayton. He went down to the quay one night, when he was,
as usual, so intoxicated as to have a very unsteady gait.
Unheeding the warnings of a companion he would venture too near
the edge; a sudden gust of wind came, he was carried off his
equilibrium and fell into the lake. His companion did all he could
to save him, but as there was a storm raging at the time, his
efforts were unavailing. He said Ginsling's bloated face appeared
for a moment in the hollow of the waves, and with an agonizing
tone he cried to God to save him; then a huge wave, more mighty
than its fellows, engulfed him, and he sank in life to rise no
more. A few days after his corpse was found floating upon the
water. "Accidentally drowned" was the verdict at the inquest, and
he was buried in a nameless grave, with no loved one or friend to
drop a tear on his last resting-place.
Mr. and Mrs. Sealy were completely prostrated by what had
transpired, and retired from active life to hide their sorrows
from the world; they are, I believe, so living at the present
time.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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