r my sister, so I went and called
on them. Mother asked me where I had been. I made some kind of an
excuse, but I could see by mother's eye that she did not take much stock
in it.

I remained at home, and finally got work in a fruit house on Washington
Street, at eight dollars a week. I was quite steady for a while, and
mother still had hopes of her boy. But through the same old company and
drink I lost that job.

MARRIAGE

About this time I ran across a girl who I thought would make a good
wife, and we were married. I was then in the crockery business in a
small way, and if I had stuck to business I should be worth something
now. I'll never forget the day of the wedding. The saying is, "Happy is
the bride the sun shines on," but there was no sunshine that day. It
rained, it simply poured. Mother tried to get the girl to throw me over;
she told her I would never make her a good husband; and I guess Mary was
sorry afterward that she did not take her advice.

The night of the wedding we had quite a blowout, and I was as drunk as I
could be. I'd ring in right here a bit of advice to my girl readers:
Don't ever try to convert a man--I mean one who drinks--by marrying him,
for in ninety-nine cases out of a hundred you won't succeed. In my case
I was young and did not care how the wind blew. I stayed out nights and
neglected my home, but I must say, bad as I was, I never hit my wife. I
think any man that raises his hand to hit a woman is worse than a cur,
and that he will certainly be punished in some way for it.

Things went from bad to worse, and one day I came home to the store and
there was no wife. She had gone. Married and deserted in two months! I
felt sore, and all I thought about was to get even with my wife. I sold
out the business, got a couple hundred dollars together, and started
after her. I found out that she had gone to Oswego, and I sent her a
telegram and was met at the station by her brother. It did not take me
long to get next to him. In a very short time I had him thinking there
was no one like Ranney. Mary and I made up and I promised never to drink
again, and we started for New York. My promises were easily broken, for
before we got to Syracuse both her brother and I were pretty drunk.

After reaching New York we went to mother's house and stayed there until
we got rooms, which we did in a few days. Mary's brother got work in a
lumberyard. I hunted as usual for a job, praying I wouldn't get it.