Raffles, the
popular Congregational minister, had wine and cakes brought out, when I
and my superintendent called on him one morning. Wine and cakes, or
cakes and spirits, were placed on the table by all who were not too poor
to buy such things, and even the poorer members contrived to supply
themselves with rum or whisky. And all expected the preachers to drink.
And the preachers did drink. Mr. Allin, my superintendent, was not by
far the greatest drinker in the Connexion, yet he seldom allowed the
poison placed before him to remain untasted. I was so organized, that I
never could drink a full glass of either wine or ale without feeling
more or less intoxicated, and for spirits I had quite a distaste; so
that I was obliged to take intoxicating drinks very sparingly. Yet I
conformed, to some extent, to the prevailing custom; and it was not, I
fear, through any great goodness of my own, that I did not become a
drunkard. Several of my fellow-ministers became drunkards. Mr. Allin
himself, after he fell under the influence of that bad rich man at
Sheffield became a drunkard, and brought on shocks of paralysis by his
excesses. My superintendent at Sheffield drank himself into _delirium
tremens_, and I fear he never got over his bad habits. Mr. Chapman was a
notorious sot. I knew him personally, and was compelled, at times, to
witness his disgusting habits. Yet he was never expelled, though he was
superannuated some forty years or more before his death. His
superannuation reduced his income some seventy-five per cent., and made
it impossible for him to drink so freely as he had been wont, and so,
very probably, helped to prolong his miserable life.

While stationed at Liverpool, I was called away to supply the place of
the superintendent preacher in the Chester circuit for a few weeks, who
had died very suddenly, under very peculiar circumstances. His name was
Dunkerley. I was told by persons likely to know the truth, that he was a
very drunken man. On one occasion, while he was over at Liverpool, he
fell down in the Theatre Square, and had to be taken up and carried into
a neighboring shop. At first it was supposed he had had a fit; but a
little further attention to the case revealed the secret that he was
drunk. On another occasion, on his return from Liverpool to Chester, he
was observed, when he got off the coach, to stagger backwards and fall
down. Some friends that were waiting for his arrival, ran and helped him
up, a