Anti-slavery bugle. [volume] (New-Lisbon, Ohio) 1845-1861, 1847-09-17

~ HSOA DS2oNta ~
was the old story of the mote and the beam,
the miserable effect of want of self-examina-
ton and reflection.
But every moment bears the seed Of change
the present is passing away, the future UNI
folding. Where there Is not moral progress,
there is moral deterioration; there is 10 safe
ty but in an unceasing endeavor at improve
ment. The woman who does not help to
build a husbands fortune, assists to pull it
down the union that is not marked by
moral progress proceeds and closes in mo-
raj misery. The arrears of the domestic du-
ties make a dread account, and Heaven
help the moral bankrupt before whom they
are laid
On a Summer evening, somewhat more
than twelve months after the little incident
of the station house, Martha was seated at
her window busy at her needle, when the
sound of the drum and fife, and the tramp of
feet, induced her TO drop her work into her
lap and look out. She saw the recruiting
sergeant who had been for some time located
in the neighborhood, passing with a band Of
recruits. Among the usual crowd on such
occasions, one group arrested her attention.;
it was a staggering, haggard-looking man,
with a shrieking woman clinging to him
three or four children were hanging about
her, and adding by their cries to the clamor.
A glance suficed to show Martha that this
was the unhappy family of the Walkers, and
a shiver of instructive sympathy attested her
strong feeling at the spectacle they present
ed. The passionate tenderness and touching
tones that gushed from the lips of the dis
tracted Bessie every 10Y and then fell dis
tinctly on her ear, till the efforts Of the gath
ering %neighbors prevailed, and the exhausted
wife and her weeping little ones were reno
we'd. The band again fell in order, the mu-
sic grew louder and merrier, and Martha loo
ked at the men to see if among the sergeant's
prey she might discover any other Of her
neighbors, when, bringing up the rear, she
beheld Robinson. With a slow, sad step,
a pale cheek, but a melancholy resolution in
his bearing, George came on; as he passed
his own dwelling, he raised his detected eyes
and met those of his wife-a momentary and
expressive gesture with his hand seemed to
say-"lt is all over; better cut the knot l
cannot disentangle; | have done it and fare
well !"
When she recovered from the stunning eff
fects of the sight, she rushed to the bed of
her sleeping child, and wrapping it up, went
forth with 1t in her arms, conscious that it
plead for her in a manner that she could not
plead for herself. Thoughts like lightning
passed through her brain as she hurried along
to the place where the military PARTY had
halted. The hour of parting, like the power
OF death, yields a back ground, upon which
the object about to be lost stands forth in Pc
culiar brightness. All the hitherto unestima.
ted qualities of George Robinson blazed up
on the perception of his wife, and her own
faults and deficiencies took a dark array be-
side them. Charities uncultivated die out,
or fall into allegiance, often lying so dormant
that the stir of strong events is necessary to
revive them. Why, why will any leave the
heart thus fallow, for the harrow of death or
sorrow TO quicken it into only unavai!ing
fruitfulness!
George and Martha met and parted, with
deep and tender feeling, with renewed con-
sc!ousness Of the early love that had first
brought them together, and of the individual
merits by which each were Distinguished
At that moment, Martha (for with her our
moral mostly rests) saw the errors that had
marked her course, the faults that had de-
formed her character and spoiled her happi-
ness. Had the considerations condensed
into that brief space been spread through
her previous life, allotting to each day some
little portion of appreciation of the present
and reflection for the future, how different
had been its course and its now probable
close!
George had folded her and his child to his
heart he had blessed them, and left the lar
ger portion of the bounty money that had
helped TO bride him to the trade of blood
for 1t was at a period when the wild work of
war was rife; and with such solace as these
could yield, she returned home.
Home what was it to her now! A des-
ert, from which the stir Of life, the spring of
action, had departed. She sat down amid
that scene-so changed, yet still the same
and wept over the bitter review which it
suggested. Oh, now to hear that approach
which she had so often met with indifference
or unkindness! Her child woke-woke
with her sobs and the falling of her tears up
on its face. 1t looked up with the bland
open expression which it derived from its
father, and kneeling in her lap, clasped its
little arms about her neck. What a lesson
Nature, that gentle teacher, uttered no re-
proach. 1t said, "Come back, thou errinp
one /; consider thy ways and be WISER"
New scenes and trials opened upon the
unhappy men who had rashly abandoned
their homes and social duties. They Joined
their regiment, and soon trod the shores
where the genius of war was shaping the diff
ferent destinies of Wellington and Napoleon:
for the one. laurels and longevity-for the
other, exile and the double canker that de-.
voured mind and body. Sorrows at home
had made Robinson and Walker companions;
hardship abroad made them friends. Mutual
sympathies, common recollections, and strug-
giles, drew them together; when the weary
day, which had seen them plunging into pas
ses or tangled coverts-Ioiling through deep
ravines or over rugged mountains, harrassed
worn, and wasted, came to a close, they cow
cred over the bivouack fire together, and
were more often in communion on the past
than engaged upon the present for, with the
clingings of a failing man, Walker would
continually revert to home. Long before he
had left it, he had yielded to habits of intern
perance, which now told against his consti-
tuition, and Robinson was called upon for
much e~xertion in his behalf, which. with his