Day months after they were written; but they always reached him. The secret of this cure, as the patient has often asserted, was total abstinence. He had attempted to reduce his daily quantity a hundred times; but never, until he entered the Home, was he aware of the physical _impossibility_ of a drunkard's becoming a moderate drinker. From the moment when he had a clear, intellectual comprehension of that truth, the spell was broken: abstinence was easy; he was himself again. Then there was Y----, a Philadelphia street savage,--one of those firemen who used to sleep in the engine-house, and lie in wait for rival companies, and make night and day hideous with slaughter. Fearful beings were those Philadelphia firemen of twenty years ago! Some of them made a nearer approach to total depravity than any creatures I have ever seen that wore the form of man,--revelling in blood, exulting in murder, and glorying in hellish blows with iron implements, given and received. It was difficult to say whether it gave them keener delight to wound or to be wounded. In all communities where external observances and decorums become tyrannical, and where the innocent pleasures of youth are placed under a ban, there is sure to be a class which revolts against the invisible despot, and goes to a horrid extreme of violence and vice. This Y---- was one of the revolters. Once in many weeks he would return to his decent home, ragged and penniless, to be reclothed. It is only alcohol that supports men in a life of _wanton_ violence like this; and he, accordingly, was a deep and reckless drinker. His sister prevailed upon him, after many months of persuasion, to go to the Home in Boston, and he presented himself there one morning, black all over with coal-dust. He explained his appearance by saying that he had come from Philadelphia in a coal-vessel. Dr. Day, who had been notified of his coming, received him with that emphatic politeness which produces such magical effects upon men who have long been accustomed to see an enemy in every one who behaves decently and uses the English language in its simplicity. He was exceedingly astonished to be treated with consideration, and to discover that he was not to be subjected to any disagreeable process. He proved to be a good, simple soul, very ignorant, not naturally intelligent, and more capable, therefore, of faith than of knowledge. The Doctor won his confidence; then his good-will; then his affection. Something that was read in the Bible attracted his attention one day, and he asked to be shown the passage; and this was the beginning of his reading the Bible regularly. It was all new to him; he found it highly interesting; and, this daily reading being associated in his mind with his reform, the book became a kind of talisman to him, and he felt safe as long as he continued the practice. After a six months' residence, he went to work in Boston, but always returned to spend the evening at the Home. At the