The Temperance Meeting.
"Deacon," said Joe Digg, "I've heerd of your dyspepsy for nigh on to twenty year; did prayin' ever comfort your stomach?"
The whole audience indulged in a profane laugh, and the good deacon was suddenly hauled down by his wife. The drunkard continued:
"There's lots of jest sech folks, here in Backley, an' ev'ry where's else—people that don't get half fed, an' do get worked half to death. Nobody means to 'buse 'em, but they do hev a hard time of it, an' whisky's the best friend they've got."
"I work my men from sunrise to sunset in summer, myself," said Deacon Towser, jumping up again, "an' I'm the first man in the field, an' the last man to quit. But I don't drink no liquor, an' my boys don't, neither."
"But ye don't start in the mornin' with hungry little faces a hauntin' ye—ye don't take the dry crusts to the field for yer own dinner, an' leave the meat an' butter at home for the wife an' young 'uns. An' ye go home without bein' afeard to see a half-fed wife draggin' herself aroun' among a lot of puny young 'uns that don't know what's the matter with 'em. Jesus Christ hissef broke down when it come to the cross, deac'n, an' poor human bein's sometimes reaches a pint where they can't stan' no more, an' when its wife an' children that brings it on, it gits a man awful."
"The gentleman is right, I have no doubt," said the Chairman, "so far as a limited class is concerned, but of course no such line of argument applies to the majority of cases. There are plenty of well-fed, healthy, and lazy young men hanging about the tavern in this very village."
"I know it," said Joe Digg, "an' I want to talk about them too. I don't wan't to take up all the time of this meetin', but you'll all 'low I know more 'bout that tavern than any body else does. Ther' is lots of young men a hanging aroun' it, an' why—'cos it's made pleasant for 'em, an' it's the only place in town that is. I've been a faithful attendant at that tavern for nigh onto twenty year, an' I never knowed a hanger-on there that had a comfortable home of his own. Some of them that don't hev to go to bed hungry hev scoldin' or squabblin' parents, an' they can't go a visitin' an' hear fine music, an' see nice things of every sort to take their minds off, as some young men in this meetin' house can. But the tavern is allus comfortable, an' ther's generally somebody to sing a song and tell a joke, an' they commence goin' ther' more fur a pleasant time than for a drink, at fust. Ther's lots of likely boys goin' there that I wish to God 'd stay away, an' I've often felt like tellin' 'em so, but what's the use? Where are they to go to?"
"They ort to flee from even the appearance of evil," said Deacon Towser.