“Yes,” sez Arvilly, “if poundin’ his wife to jelly, and his children to deformity and death, is a Poor Man’s Club, the saloon is one.”
Sez he agin, “Rich men have their clubs to which they may go, and drink all they choose––carouse, do as they please, and why not poor men, too?” he added.
And I sez, “Grantin’ that rich men do drink and carouse at their clubs, as I don’t know whether they do or not, two wrongs never made one right, and the liquor couldn’t hurt ’em so much, for they can buy it pure, and the poor man’s 121 drink is pizen by adulteration, makin’ a more dangerous drunk, ruinin’ their health and makin’ ’em spilin’ for fights and bloodshed. The rich man can stay all night at his club, or if he goes home the decorous butler or vally can tend to him and protect his family if need be; he won’t stagger in at midnight to a comfortless room, where his wife and little ones are herded in cold and starvation and are alone and at his mercy, and the rich man’s carouse at his club won’t keep his wife and children hungry for a week.”
Bein’ driv out of that position Elder Wessel tried a new tact: “The poor man has just as much right to the social enjoyment they git out of their saloon as you have, madam, to your afternoon teas and church socials.”
“What hinders the poor man from ’tendin’ socials?” sez Arvilly, spiritedly. “They are always bein’ teased to, and anyway I never knew tea to make anybody crazy drunk.”
“The poor man,” sez Elder Wessel in his most dictorial way, all of Arvilly’s talk havin’ slipped offen him like rain water offen a brass horn, “the poor man, after he has worked hard all day, and has nothing to go home to but a room full of cryin’ children, discomfort, squalor and a complaining wife, is justified in my opinion to go to the only bright, happy place he knows of, the saloon.”
But I sez, bein’ such a case for justice, “How is it with the wife who has worked hard all day in the home of discomfort and squalor, her work being rendered ten times harder and more nerve destroying than her husband’s by the care of the cryin’ children, how would it be for them, who are equally responsible for the marriage and the children, to take holt together and make the children happier and the home less full of discomfort?”
“Yes,” sez Arvilly, “is it goin’ to make the home less full of discomfort to have him reel home at midnight and dash the hungry cryin’ baby aginst the wall and put out its feeble life, and mebby kill the complainin’ wife too?”
“Oh, those are extreme cases and uncommon,” sez Elder Wessel.