e years, I think, from the time the grog-shop was opened by his
wife, he was in a drunkard's grave. A year or two more, and the pit
that was digged for others by the hands of the wife, she fell into
herself. After breathing an atmosphere poisoned by the fumes of liquor,
the love of tasting it was gradually formed, and she, too, in the end,
became a slave to the Demon Drink. She died at last, poor as a beggar
in the street. Ah! this liquor-selling is the way to ruin; and they who
open the gates, as well as those who enter the downward path, alike go
to destruction. But this is digressing.

After Joe Morgan and his wife left the "Sickle and Sheaf," with that
gentle child, who, as I afterward learned, had not, for a year or more,
laid her little head to sleep until her father returned home and who,
if he stayed out beyond a certain hour, would go for him, and lead him
back, a very angel of love and patience--I re-entered the bar-room, to
see how life was passing there. Not one of all I had left in the room
remained. The incident which had occurred was of so painful a nature,
that no further unalloyed pleasure was to be had there during the
evening, and so each had retired. In his little kingdom the landlord
sat alone, his head resting on his hand, and his face shaded from the
light. The whole aspect of the man was that of one in self-humiliation.
As I entered he raised his head, and turned his face toward me. Its
expression was painful.

"Rather an unfortunate affair," said he. "I'm angry with myself, and
sorry for the poor child. But she'd no business here. As for Joe
Morgan, it would take a saint to bear his tongue when once set a-going
by liquor. I wish he'd stay away from the house. Nobody wants his
company. Oh, dear!"

The ejaculation, or rather groan, that closed the sentence showed how
little Slade was satisfied with himself, notwithstanding this feeble
attempt at self-justification.

"His thirst for liquor draws him hither," I remarked. "The attraction
of your bar to his appetite is like that of the magnet to the needle.
He cannot stay away."

"He MUST stay away!" exclaimed the landlord, with some vehemence of
tone, striking his fist upon the table by which he sat. "He MUST stay
away! There is scarcely an evening that he does not ruffle my temper,
and mar good feelings in all the company. Just see what he provoked me
to do this evening. I might have killed the child. It makes my blood
run cold to think of it!