In a few moments the trusty returned with the man he was sent to summon. The jail garb did not wholly hide his handsome form, nor the cropped hair entirely vulgarize the intellectual countenance which fell as he saw strangers looking at him. He seemed to wonder why he was ordered up before the warden; there was shame, sorrow, helplessness in his face as I rose, with the paper in my hand and walked toward him.
“John,” said the warden, “this gentleman has a few words to say to you.”
The convict braced himself for the interview, and I said, “Your name is John R., I believe.” “Yes,” he replied steadily.
“I have here,” I went on, “a paper addressed to you, signed by the President of the United States. It is a pardon. You are a free man, John.”
The look of assumed courage in his eyes changed to one of infinite pathos, then softened piteously as his soul swooned with joy that was almost too much. I saw him sway as if to fall, but caught him, and leaning on my shoulder, he said, “Free! free! O God, is it true? When can I go home?” “This very moment,” said I. He looked wistfully out the great door where the sentry stood, and asked, “Can I go out there now.”
“Yes,” I said, “come, I will go with you,” and arm in arm we walked down the great stone stair, passed the guards into the street and across to a fence beyond. He stopped a pace or two away, looked at the emerald hills, the river flowing by, the children passing, the firmament above, and as the happy tears drenched his face, said: “O, sir, I am the happiest man alive. When does the train start East?” “At three,” I said, “I will see you safely started.”
“Wont my wife and baby Jess be glad to-morrow, and mother, how she will smile; I am eager to be off.” I took him in and soon saw him fitted with the civilian’s clothes and provided with the railway ticket to his destination, and with the $10 the State gives every released convict.[convict.]
How proudly he walked by my side to the station, and as the bell clanged, he held my hand and said, “You talk to hundreds of young men. Sir[Sir], tell them this, tell it with burning eloquence, tell it with pleading tears, beware of gaming, shun gamblers as lepers. Cards are accursed of God, and pass-ports to perdition. Will you tell them this?” And as the train moved off I said, “I will.”
To this end I write a chapter in this book, that by earnest warning or brotherly appeal, I may help to pluck young men out of the hands of this giant enemy of our race, and perhaps halt some who are already hurrying down this highway to dishonor. Standing here at the very gates of these polluted temples, where many have been cruelly “done to death,” I raise the cry “beware of gaming. It dishonors God, degrades man, wrecks honor, ruins business, destroys homes, breaks wifely hearts, steals babes’ bread, brings mothers sorrowing to the grave, and at last, with reckless bravado, launches the sinful soul into the path of God’s descending wrath, to be overwhelmed forever.”
The only argument offered by gamblers is that their business keeps money in circulation. It does, indeed, transferring it from the pocket of the fool to that of the knave, and thence to the pockets of the harlot or rum-seller, but there is no gain in this transaction. Better the money had remained where it was, or been put to other uses.