; and how many others suffer from
its effects in their husbands and fathers. I wish we girls could do
something to put it down."

"You can," said Etta. "If every girl in the land were to set her foot
down against having anything to do with young men who drink, there would
soon be a change. I am resolved," she said, in her old impetuous way,
"never to associate with any young man, no matter how good or elegant he
may be, who even tastes wine occasionally."

"That is a rash resolve, Etta," said her sister, "and one that I fear
you will find it hard to carry out. Yet, what you say is right, in the
main. Girls do not enough realize the great responsibility of their
influence over young men."

"No," said Agnes Burchard, with a sigh. And several remembered how much
she had been seen with poor Harry and what jokes had been made about
their intimacy. "I always knew that Harry Pemberton drank occasionally;
but I thought it manly, and like--like Mr. James."

No one answered this rather unfortunate remark; but presently Katie
Robertson said:--

"Don't you think, Miss Etta, people ought to begin with the boys--before
they have learned to drink, I mean."

"A good suggestion, Katie, since an ounce of prevention is said to be
better than a pound of cure. How would you set about doing it?"

But Katie, having thus drawn all eyes upon herself, blushed, and did not
feel like speaking. So Miss Eunice came to her rescue:--

"We might organize some kind of a society, of which the boys and younger
girls could be members. It would be some trouble to keep it up, but it
would be directly in the line of that service to which you pledged
yourselves, girls, that bright first Sunday in September."

"Delightful!" said Etta, to whom every new thing always seemed so. "A
boys' and girls' temperance society, with a pledge that they shall never
in their lives taste anything that can intoxicate. Then they will grow
up temperance boys and girls from the start."

"There are two objections to pledging children--that is, very young
ones," said Eunice. "The first is, from the unwillingness often felt by
their parents; and the other, that many of them do not fully understand
what they are about, and as they grow older often break their pledge, on
the ground that they are not bound by a promise made when they were too
young to understand it."

"Well, some of them keep it, and that's so much gained."

"Yes; for them. But to break solemnly made vows i