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FRANCES E. WILLARD.

A

MAY PRESTON SLOSSON.

LL of the woe of the world, its hideous squalor and sin,
Its riotous unrest and deadly sickness at heart,

Find inarticulate voice in the city's horrible din;

Fuller of dread than the storm that wrenches the stout ship apart.

Up from the country's calm, unbroken save by the bees
Busily humming their hymns of joyous labor and life,
Or the song of mated birds, or the whisper of scented breeze,
Came a woman with earnest eyes, to take her part in the
strife.

In the conflict of right against wrong and of love against might;

In the clash of classes-the sterner battle with sin!

Into the blinding blackness she carried a ray of light,

And the voice of an angel was heard as it hushed the hideous din.

To man--bond-slave of the flesh, forgetting he had a soul, Or struggling feebly against the power of passion and thirst,

Hating himself and his chains--this sweet voice softly stole. With a note of triumph it rang as it promised him freedom

first.

Freedom from the wild beast-not yet outgrown by the race, Release from habit's hold, from appetite's tiger-claw;

And, then, to keep him secure of his loftier place,

Around him thrown the strong right arm of the Law!

Hushed is the loving heart that beat alone for her kind,
Silenced the silver voice that spoke the eloquent word

Ever and only for right; the clear-eyed vision is blind To the light of the earth she loved. Our friend and sister has heard

The Master's welcome: "Well done!" She has gone, and we can not grieve

That rest has come for the weary, and yet unfaltering, feet That often trod upon thorns. Rejoicing, we must believe That all is well with her, and the bravely-won recompense sweet!

But what for us who remain? Is the battle over at last? Are there no more foes to fight? Are sin and appetite slain?

Let us hold with firmer hand the hard-won price of the past; Work so well that her loyal life shall not have been lived in vain!

DEACON GILES'S DISTILLERY.

DEACON

GEORGE BARRELL CHEEVER.

and was

EACON GILES was a man who loved money, never troubled with tenderness of conscience. His father and his grandfather before him had been distillers, and the same occupation had come to him as an heirloom in the family.

Deacon Giles worked on the Sabbath. He would suffer the fires of the distillery neither to go out, nor to burn while he was idle, so he kept as busy as they. One Saturday afternoon his workmen had quarreled, and all went off in anger. He was in much perplexity for want of hands to do the work of the devil on the Lord's day. In the dusk of the evening a gang of singular-looking fellows entered the door of the distillery. Their dress was wild and uncouth, their eyes glared, and their language had a tone that was awful. They offered to work for the Deacon; and he, on his part, was

overjoyed, for he thought that as they had probably been turned out of employment elsewhere, he could engage them on his own terms.

He made them his accustomed offer, as much rum every day, when work was done, as they could drink; but they would not take it. Then he offered them a pittance of money; but they set up such a laugh that he thought the roof of the building would fall in. They demanded a sum which the Deacon said he could not give, and would not, to the best set of workmen that ever lived. Finally, he said he would give half what they asked, if they would take two-thirds of that in Bibles. When he mentioned the word "Bibles," they all looked toward the door and made a step backward, and the Deacon thought they trembled; but whether it was with anger or delirium tremens or something else he could not tell. However, they winked and made signs to each other, and then agreed with the Deacon that if he would let them work by night instead of day, they would stay with him awhile and work on his own terms. To this the Deacon agreed, and locked up the doors, leaving the distillery to his new work

men.

In the morning the Deacon was puzzled to find the distillery empty, but fast locked as he had left it. He was still more amazed to find that his workmen had done more work in one night than could have been accomplished, in the ordinary way, in three weeks. He pondered the thing not a little, and almost concluded that it was the work of supernatural agents. At any rate, they had done so much that he thought he could afford to attend meeting that day, as it was the Sabbath. Accordingly he went to church, and heard his minister say that God would pardon sin without an atonement, that the words "hell and devils" were mere figures of speech, and that all men would certainly be saved. He was much pleased, and inwardly resolved that he would send his minister a half-cask of wine; and as it happened to be communion Sabbath he attended meeting all day.

In the evening the men came again, and again the Deacon

locked them in to themselves, and they went to work. They finished all his molasses, and filled all his rum-barrels, and kegs, and hogsheads, with liquor; and then one of them took a great coal of fire, and having quenched it in a mixture of rum and molasses, proceeded to write invisible inscriptions upon the heads of the different vessels. Most of the titles ran thus:

"CONSUMPTION SOLD HERE.

Giles's Distillery."

Inquire at Deacon “CONVULSIONS AND EPILEPSIES. Inquire at Amos Giles's Distillery."

"INSANITY AND MURDER. Inquire at Deacon Giles's Distillery.”

"DROPSY AND RHEUMATISM, PUTRID FEVER, AND CHOLERA IN THE COLLAPSE. Inquire of Amos Giles's Distillery."

"DELIRIUM TREMENS.

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Inquire at Deacon Giles's

Many of the casks had on them inscriptions like the following:

"DISTILLED DEATH AND LIQUID DAMNATION. The elixir of Hell for the bodies of those whose souls are coming there."

Other demons even took sentences from the Scriptures, and marked the hogsheads thus:

“WHO HATH WOE? Inquire at Deacon Giles's Distillery."

"WHO HATH REDNESS OF EYES? Inquire at Deacon Giles's Distillery."

All these inscriptions burned, when visible, a "still and awful red.” One of the most terrible in its appearance was as follows: " WEEPING AND WAILING AND GNASHING OF TEETH. Inquire at Deacon Giles's Distillery.

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In the morning the workmen vanished as before, just as it was dawn, but in the dusk of the evening they came again, and told the Deacon it was against their principles to take any wages for work done between Saturday night and Monday

morning, and as they could not stay with him any longer he was welcome to what they had done. The Deacon offered to hire them for the season at any wages, but they would not. So he thanked them, and they went away, and he saw them

no more.

In the course of the week most of the casks were sent into the country, and duly hoisted in conspicuous situations in the taverns and groceries and rum-shops. But no sooner had the first glass been drawn from any of them than the invisible inscriptions flamed out on the cask-head to every beholder: "CONSUMPTION SOLD HERE," "DELIRIUM TREMENS," "DAMNATION AND HELL-FIRE." The drunkards were terrified from the dram-shops; the barrooms were emptied of their customers; but in their place a gaping crowd filled every store that possessed a cask of the Deacon's devil-distilled liquor, to wonder and be affrighted at the spectacle. No art could efface the inscriptions, and even when the liquor was drawn into new casks, the same deadly letters broke out in blue and red flame over all the surface.

The rumsellers and grocers and tavern-keepers were full of fury. They loaded their teams with the accursed liquor, and drove it back to the distillery. All around and before the door of the Deacon's establishment the returned casks were piled one upon another, and it seemed as if the inscriptions burned brighter than ever. "Consumption," "Damnation," "Death" and "Hell," mingled together in frightful confusion; and in equal prominence, in every case, flamed out the direction: "INQUIRE AT DEACON GILES'S DISTILLERY." One would have thought that the bare sight would have been enough to terrify every drunkard from his cups, and every trader from the dreadful traffic in ardent spirits. Indeed, it had some effect for a time, but it was not lasting, and the demons knew it would not be when they played the trick; for they knew the Deacon would continue to make rum, and that as long as he continued to make it, there would be people to buy and drink it. And so it proved.

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