“No one,” wrote his father, in reply, “could like Uncle Isaac so well as I know he does unless there was some good in them, and some hope of them.”
Captain Rhines shook his head. He had seen, in a life spent at sea, too much of the strength of the appetite for liquor to leap at conclusions.
One morning after breakfast, as Ben was going to the field, he saw James, as they now called him, paddling out of the cove in the birch. Two days after, about ten o’clock in the forenoon, Uncle Isaac espied from his point the birch half way over to Elm Island. She was apparently empty, drifting down the bay with the tide.
He waited a while, and seeing no one coming after her, took his boat, and pulled off, when he found James Welch flat on his back in the bottom of her, and an empty bottle beside him. He was completely stupefied with liquor. It appeared afterwards that he had gone along shore gunning, camped a night in the woods, and the next afternoon came upon some men who were making potash, and well provided with liquor. They offered him some. This awoke the slumbering appetite. He bought a bottle, and kept drinking. Through the aid of that Providence which seems to watch over drunkards, he made out to get into the birch, and push off, when becoming helpless, the tide was drifting him to sea. Uncle Isaac, with a sad heart, towed the birch, with its occupant, to the island. Ben took him up in his arms, carried him to the house, and laid him on the bed.
Sally, who had felt greatly encouraged, was affected to tears.
“Stop to dinner, Uncle Isaac.”
“I’ll stop and rest, and cool off, Benjamin; but as for eating, this thing has taken away all my appetite.”
“I’m sorry for his poor parents; but I’m afraid it’s no use.”
“O, Ben, it’s too much! It’s more than I can bear to see so fine a young fellow go to ruin right before my eyes! We’ve done all that can be done in the way of counsel, coaxing, and kindness. I mean to give him a dose of quicksilver.”
When James Welch recovered his senses, his reflections were most harrowing. Having formed a strong and healthy attachment to Ben and his family, he was deeply mortified when he reflected upon the exhibition he had made of himself before them. But he was, most of all, attached to Uncle Isaac, and loved him with all his heart. How he got back to the island, whether Uncle Isaac knew what had taken place, were questions he could not solve, and was too proud to ask.