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Then do not drink again, papa,
Oh, do not drink again!
You know 'twill grieve my poor mama,
Oh, do not drink again !
From "Tlze Firesz"de Book; or Monuments of Temperance,"
Phila.,
i853.
ROBERT'S RETURN
R
OBERT
L
returned home one dark, stormy mid–
night, after a "wine drink" to find himself locked
out by a loving wife, Eliza, who feared he would not
return ere morning.
Finally the door was opened and the incensed man rushed
at his affrighted wife who, obeying the impulses of fear, escaped
his grasp, while he staggered to a closet and drank a flagon of
brandy.
Eliza rekindled the fire and was hastening to prepare sup–
per for him when, with an awful oath, he demanded to know
whether she meant to insult him by getting supper at that time
of night and, without listening to her meek reply, caught up a
croquet mallet and seizing her by the hair, with more than
fiendish wickedness and savage barbarity, dealt a blow upon her
head, which drove reason from its throne and, shortly after the
horrid act, the spirit from its tenement.
When soberness returned and the husband gazed upon the
tragic figure cold in death, he turned to leave the room, was
seized with a paroxysm and reeling, fell, a lifeless corpse.
One grave was opened to receive them both.
Cold Water Magazine,
i842.
[ 93}