"No, no, no; I am not; I can not be, now you are here! Walter, we shall be late; we must dress to see your uncle. I am sober, indeed I am." Fresh guests now arrived; the miserable husband locked his no less wretched wife in her room, and hastened to apologize for her unexpected illness. Again he forgave her, and again she sinned: the greatest pang, the shame of detection, was over--the demon of drink was now ascendant. A puny wailing child was born, that child for whom the father had once so fondly hoped, but whose advent was now a fresh link in misery's chain. Even the babe paid the penalty of its mother's vice by its enfeebled frame, its neglected state; its earliest nutriment was poisoned. Rosa was soon debarred one of the holiest pleasures of maternity--her child was taken from her fever-laden breast. It became very ill; nature's voice was heard, the mother sacrificed her habits to her child. A new and celebrated physician was called in: he carefully examined the poor infant. "Strange," he said; "now, had this child been born in a less respectable sphere, I should say it was suffering from a drunken parent." A muttered curse escaped from Walter, a cry from Rosa. The doctor looked at her more narrowly; in her watery eye and shaking hand he read the truth of his accusation. "You have killed the child, madam," he continued. "Be thankful it is your only one." Could not that little pallid face, peeping from its shroud, the father's mighty grief, her own despair, her agony, as each toll of the funeral bell fell on her crushed brain, and seemed to repeat the physician's words--could not this check her mad career? No, all was blighted around her--she had not a hope left; she drank for oblivion. And Walter?--alas! he now drank with her. He long struggled with his dreary discomforts at home, with the dull, companionless evenings, when his Rosa, that once highly-gifted creature, lay steeped in the coarsest Lethe, or would in wild intoxication hurl reproaches at him. He had taken the keys from her; she broke open the locks; she bribed the servants for drink; she parted from her valuables, even his books and plate, to procure the necessary stimulant; she made his disgrace and hers public. No friend could come to their house, such fearful scenes occasionally took place there: his home was blasted--drink became his solace. The wild orgies of their despair were indeed terrible: but I need not dwell on this repulsive theme; suffice it to say, Walter's affairs were now entirely neglected--he was soon irretrievably ruined.