The Lights and Shadows of Real LifeArthur, T. S. (Timothy Shay)
General
The Lights and Shadows of Real Life
Arthur, T. S. (Timothy Shay)
Conduct of life -- Fiction; Temperance -- Fiction
"Other matters calling me away, I staid only to see this delightful
little scene, and then hurried back to the Harmony House, to see if
the run was kept up. Customers came in a steady stream, and crowded
the bar of our worthy friend, whose heart was as light as a feather.
I saw at least half a dozen come in and sip a glass of Sub-Treasury,
who I knew had not tasted liquor for months. I marked them; and
shall be about their path occasionally. But the best thing of all
that I saw, was a reformer break his pledge. He was, years ago, a
noted drunkard, but had been a reformed man for four years. In that
time he had broken up several grog-shops, by reforming all their
customers, and had got, I suppose, not less than five or six hundred
persons to sign the pledge. I had, of course, a particular grudge
against him. It was an exceedingly warm day, and he was uncommonly
thirsty. He was reading the paper, and came across the
'Sub-Treasury' advertisement.
"'Ha! ha! What is this, I wonder?' he said, laughing; some new trick
of the enemy, I suppose.'
"'Look here, what is this Sub-Treasury stuff, that Graves advertises
this morning?' he said, to a young fellow, a protege
of mine, who was more than a match for him.
"'A kind of temperance beverage.' I put it into the fellow's head to
say.
"'Temperance beverage?'
"'Yes. It's made of lemonpeel, and one stuff or other, mixed up with
pounded ice. He's got a tremendous run for it. I know half a dozen
teetotallers who get it regularly. I saw three or four there to-day,
at one time.'
"'Indeed!'
"'It's a fact. Come, won't you go down and try a glass? It's
delightful.'
"'Are you in earnest about it?'
"'Certainly I am. It's one of the most delicious drinks that has
been got up this season.'
"'I don't like to be seen going into such a place.'
"'O, as to that, there is a fine back entrance leading in from
another street, that no one suspects, and a private bar into the
bargain. We can go in and get a drink, and nobody will ever see us.'
"'Well, I don't care if I do,' said the temperance man, 'for I am
very dry.'
"'You're a gone gozzling, my old chap,' I said, as I saw him moving
off. 'I thought I'd get you before long.' Sure enough, the moment he
took the first draught his doom was sealed. His former desire for
liquor came back on him with irresistible power; and before
nightfall, he was so drunk that he went staggering along the street,
to the chagrin and consternation of the teetotallers; but to the
infinite delight of your humble servant.
"And so saying, that malignant fiend, who, while he inhabited a
material body, was called old Billy Adams, stepped down from the
still. Then there arose three loud and long cheers, for Graves, and
his 'Sub-Treasury,' that echoed and re-echoed wildly through that
gloomy prison-house.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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