"Nat is a smart feller," said the rumseller; "but he'll have to be a good deal smarter before he can get many people to say they'll never drink."
"That's certain," responded the customer. "There is no use in trying to do what can't be done. But boys are getting to know more than their fathers in these ere times. I 'spose there are some folks who would like to tell us what we shall eat and wear, and what we shan't."
"I wonder if Jim Cole joined the society?" inquired the rumseller.
"Jim! no! you wouldn't ketch him to make such a dunce of himself. He believes in using a little when he wants it, and that's my doctrine."
"Jim is steady as a deacon natrally," continued the vender, "and I didn't know but he might be influenced by Nat to join."
"He didn't; for he told me that he shouldn't sign away his liberty for anybody, and he said that he told Nat, and the other fellers, that they would drink wine at the first party they went to."
"He was wrong there, I'm thinking," answered the rumseller; "for Nat is independent, and he don't back out of any thing he undertakes. He'll be the last one to give it up."
"Doesn't Jim patronize you sometimes?"
"Yes; he occasionally drops in, and takes a little; but Jim doesn't favor hard drinking. He thinks that many men drink too much."
If all the remarks and discussions that were consequent upon the organization of the Total Abstinence Society, could be collected, the result would be a volume. But we must be satisfied with this single illustration, and pass on.