in each of the mixture, steaming
hot, and sat down to consume it at leisure. This was very well so far,
for furmity, as the woman had said, was nourishing, and as proper a
food as could be obtained within the four seas; though, to those not
accustomed to it, the grains of wheat swollen as large as lemon-pips,
which floated on its surface, might have a deterrent effect at first.

But there was more in that tent than met the cursory glance; and the
man, with the instinct of a perverse character, scented it quickly.
After a mincing attack on his bowl, he watched the hag's proceedings
from the corner of his eye, and saw the game she played. He winked to
her, and passed up his basin in reply to her nod; when she took a bottle
from under the table, slily measured out a quantity of its contents, and
tipped the same into the man's furmity. The liquor poured in was rum.
The man as slily sent back money in payment.

He found the concoction, thus strongly laced, much more to his
satisfaction than it had been in its natural state. His wife had
observed the proceeding with much uneasiness; but he persuaded her to
have hers laced also, and she agreed to a milder allowance after some
misgiving.

The man finished his basin, and called for another, the rum being
signalled for in yet stronger proportion. The effect of it was soon
apparent in his manner, and his wife but too sadly perceived that in
strenuously steering off the rocks of the licensed liquor-tent she had
only got into maelstrom depths here amongst the smugglers.

The child began to prattle impatiently, and the wife more than once said
to her husband, "Michael, how about our lodging? You know we may have
trouble in getting it if we don't go soon."

But he turned a deaf ear to those bird-like chirpings. He talked loud to
the company. The child's black eyes, after slow, round, ruminating gazes
at the candles when they were lighted, fell together; then they opened,
then shut again, and she slept.

At the end of the first basin the man had risen to serenity; at the
second he was jovial; at the third, argumentative, at the fourth, the
qualities signified by the shape of his face, the occasional clench of
his mouth, and the fiery spark of his dark eye, began to tell in his
conduct; he was overbearing--even brilliantly quarrelsome.

The conversation took a high turn, as it often does on such occasions.
The ruin of good men by bad wives, and, more particularly, the
frustratio