orpe was
setting down on paper a list of the groceries wanted, she proceeded, as
usual, to say, 'Tea--Coffee--Sugar--_Tobacco_--,' 'Stop,' said her
husband, 'I've done with that. I'll have no more.' Now, Mrs. E. had
always enjoyed seeing her husband smoke; it had often proved a powerful
sedative to him when wearied with the cares of life, and the numberless
irritations of his trying vocation, and therefore she replied,
'Nonsense, you will soon repent of that whim. I shall get two ounces as
usual, and I know you'll smoke it.' 'I shall never touch it again,' was
his firm reply, and ever after kept his word.

[Sidenote: HIS TEETOTALISM.]

A world full of misery, both temporal and spiritual, surrounds us, and
which might be effectually relieved, were all Christians, many of whom
are laggard in effort and niggard in bounty, to manifest a tithe of the
self-denial which Mr. Ellerthorpe practiced. 'What maintains one vice,
would support two children.' Robert Hall says:--It is the practice of
self-denial in a thousand little instances which forms the truest test
of character.' Mr. Fletcher, Vicar of Madeley, was on one occasion
driven close for means to discharge the claims of the poor, when he said
to his wife, 'O Polly, can we not do without beer? Let us drink water,
and eat less meat. Let our necessities give way to the extremities of
the poor.' And at a meeting held the other night, a donation was
announced thus:--'A poor man's savings from tobacco, L5.' And are there
not tens of thousands of professors who could present similar offerings
if they, in the name and spirit of their great Master, tried? Do we not
often come in contact with men who complain that they cannot contribute
to the cause of God and humanity, who, at the same time, indulge in the
use of snuff, tobacco, or intoxicating drinks; all of which might be
laid aside to the gain of God's cause, and without at all lessening
either the health, reputation, or happiness of the consumer? And are
there not others, of good social position, who do not give as much to
relieve the temporal sufferings of their fellow creatures, during twelve
months, as it costs them to provide a single feast for a few well-to-do
friends? The merchant who sold his chips and shavings, and presented the
proceeds to the cause of God, while he kept the solid timber for
himself, is the type of too many professors of religion!

CHAPTER IV.

HIS STAUNCH TEETOTALISM.

Perhaps no class