How foolish it was for Frederick to taste that liquor. He did not love gin. He disliked the taste of it. Moreover, he knew well enough that it was wrong to taste it, and I presume he saw clearly enough, at the time, that he was making a little dunce of himself. Why did he not run away, if he could not resist temptation while he stayed there? Why, when Samuel reminded him, so kindly, that it was time for them to go, did he not go along about his business? How foolish it was for him to stay and drink that dram, which tasted to him, I dare say, almost as bad as a dose of salts? Oh, if he had only had more courage, more principle! But there he failed—and his failure cost him dearly!
Samuel, you will recollect, tried to console him, after he had drank the glass of gin, to please Peter, by telling him that he was sure he would never do so again. But Samuel, it appeared afterwards, was too hopeful, too charitable. Frederick did drink again. How long it was after that holiday, before he did so, I don't know. Nor is it much matter. It is sufficient to know, that when a like temptation was placed before him again, he had less power to resist it than he had before. He drank again, and it was not many months before he liked dram-drinking as well as any of the boys in the factory.
However, Frederick had friends in the city; and when he was about twenty-one years of age, some of these friends got him a good place as a clerk in a wholesale grocery store. He seemed to "turn over a new leaf," when he went to Boston to live. If he drank any—and I suppose he did a little—his habit did not grow much stronger, and he was a very faithful clerk.
After a year or two, he did so well, that his friends loaned him money, and he went into business for himself. For a year or two he did well, and was prosperous. His credit was good. His business increased. There was no reason why he should not continue to prosper. None, did I say? There was one. His love for dram-drinking grew stronger, after a while, and he drank more and more. Not that he ever got absolutely drunk; but it was not an uncommon thing for him to get high, as they sometimes say of the first stages of drunkenness—so high that he talked and acted very like a fool.
A habit of this kind is apt to grow upon a person. It grew upon Frederick. I will not trace his path, through all its windings, from tasting to moderate drinking, from moderate drinking to drunkenness, and from drunkenness to ruin. But such was his course. He drank till he entirely lost the power of controlling his appetite. His business affairs got out of order, and they became worse and worse. He failed. Not long after this, he was often seen reeling about the streets of Boston, a poor, miserable, drunken wretch.
One night, when he was drunk, some one who knew him, ordered a carriage, and took him to the neat little cottage which was the home of his childhood. His aged parents were already aware, to some extent, of Frederick's habits; but when they saw there, before their eyes, that living wreck of what was once their son, it seemed as if their hearts would break with anguish. That night they said not a word to their son. They knew that he was not himself, and that anything he might say then, would only add to their grief.
THE DRUNKARD AND HIS FATHER.[ToList]
The next day, however, after the reason of their miserable son had been partly restored, they had a long talk with him. He knew to what a depth he had fallen. But he declared, over and over again, that there was no hope for him. "I am lost!" said he; "I am lost! Father," he continued, "I am drinking up my soul, and no power on earth can stop me. I could no more live without liquor, than a fish can live out of water. I am on fire, and nothing will help to quench the flames, but the liquor which feeds them."