Maggie became one of the household. She was washed, and fed, and clothed; and how she worked, and learnt everything, and how she listened at the temperance meetings to what "the pledge" had done, and how she wished her mother would come and try—try to leave off drinking, and become "the good mother she was when I was a little girl." For her father she had no hope. For her mother, she determined to persevere. When she was sober she would talk, and cry, and promise, but the demon rum would overcome her, and then she would curse her daughter, and call her all the vile names that the insane devil in her could invent.
And so it went on; Maggie still determined, still trying. The right time came at last. One night, Maggie was not at the meeting. By and by, there was a little stir at the door. What is the matter? A little girl is pulling a woman, almost by force, into the room. It is Maggie and her mother. She has got her old ragged dress off, and looks quite neat in one that Maggie has made for her. But she hides her face. She is ashamed to look those in the face she would have once looked down upon. A woman is speaking—women can speak upon temperance—just such a woman as herself—is it not herself—is she awake, or does she sleep and dream? If awake, she hears her own story. The story of a woman with a drunken husband. And she traces his fall from affluence down to beggary; then her fall, down, down, down, to a cellar in Farlow's Court; there her husband dies; there upon a pile of straw and rags upon the floor, in drunken unconsciousness, she gives birth to a child—a living child by the side of its dead father.
"What a night—what a scene, but you have not seen the worst of it. The very heavens, as though angry at such awful use of the gifts of reason, and the abuse of appetite, sent their forked messengers of fire to the earth—less dangerous than the fire that man bottles up for his own damnation; and the water came down in torrents, pouring into that cave where the dead, and living, and new born were lying together, and overflowed the floor, and when I felt its chill," said she, "I awaked out of my drunken sleep, and felt around me, to see, no, I could not see, all was pitch darkness. My child cried, and then—then a whole army of rats, driven in by the rain, driven by the water from the floor, came creeping on to me. Oh! how their slimy bodies felt as they crept over my face. Then I tried to awaken my husband, but he would not wake, and in my frenzy I struck and bit him—bit a dead man—for his was the sleep of eternity. Then I summoned almost superhuman strength, and creeped up the stairs and out into the court. I looked up; the storm was gone; there was a smile in heaven—it was the smile of that murdered babe; for when I had begged a light, and went back again to that dreadful, dreadful habitation—why are human beings permitted to live in such awful holes—has nobody any care for human life—what did I see? Mothers, mothers—mothers that sleep on soft couches—hear me, hear me—hear of the bitter fruits the rum trade bears—the rats had devoured the life blood of that child. What next I know not. I know that I have never drank since—never will again—by signing this pledge I was saved—all may be saved."
"All? all? Can I—can I be restored as you have been—can I shake off this demon that has dragged me down so low that my own mother would not know me; or knowing, would spurn me? Can I be saved?"
It was Maggie's mother.
"Yes, you, you, I was a thousand times worse. Look at me now."
"Yes, mother, you. Come." And she took her by the hand and led her up to the table, put a pen in her hand—dropt upon her knees—looked up to her mother imploringly—up to heaven prayerfully—her lips quivered—the tears rolled down her cheeks—"Now, mother, now."
'Tis done. She wrote her name in a fair hand—Mary Reagan—'Tis done.
'Tis done!—'tis done!—wild Maggie cries;
'Tis done!—'tis done!—the mother sighs;
'Tis done!—'tis done!—in chorus join,
To bear aloft the news along.
'Tis done!—'tis done! a voice replies,
Stand forth, be strong, and you shall rise.
And so she did. She never fell. She came to live in the house with Maggie. "I cannot go back," she said, "to live with your father, if I would stand fast; and I cannot think, after hearing that woman's story, last night, of ever drinking again. I know that woman; I knew her when she was a girl, one of the proudest and prettiest. My husband has spent many a dollar with hers in the bar-room. Oh yes, I knew her well. I did not know her last night; but when she told me who she was—that she was Elsie Wendall—then I knew her. Oh! I could tell you such a story—but not now. No! no, I cannot live with your father again, for I never will drink any more—never—never!"