Quasqueton guardian. (Quasqueton, Buchanan County, Iowa) 1856-1858, 1857-05-09

John Grey, once man of fine intellect
and generous impulses. Addicted by
early habit to take occasionally social
glass, by degrees yielding to the demands
of growing appetite and the allurements
of his gay associates, he became reduced
to the condition in which we now behold
him. All the noble aspirations of his
youth and the higher ambition of man
hood drowned in the intoxicating cup.
The little fortune bequethed by his father,
with his own hard earnings for ten years,
that which should have been home, and
food, and raiment for his suffering family,
all dissolved, like Cleopatra's pearl, IN
the glass, and poured down his insatiate
throat. Not that John Grey's moral sense
was entirely obliterated and he saw not
; the wreck he had made of himself, o no,
there were moments when he felt too
painfully his own degradation, and men
tally resolved to free himself from such
humiliating bondage; but his born
resolutions were as weak as straws, a
breath could turn them; the jeers of his
old companions, or the ill-timed refec-
tons Of his unhappy wife were enough
to send him again u the source of all his
misery.
Mrs. Grey was naturally an amiable
but weak-minded woman, and now,
through long continued discouragements,
privatlo n and notifications, she was con-
tinually sunk in detection or aroused only
TO a sense of the wrongs she suffered and
the cares which annoyed her. AT such
times she lost her stolid indifference and
broke forth into angry taunts and bitter
reproaches. Alas for the holy altar of
home when lighted only by the fires of
discord. Alas for the unsullied infant
souls there to receive their first teachings
from the book of human life, too often a
book of woes. But 10 hasten our tale.
After the usual flow of wit, flourish of
sentiment, and emptying of glasses, the
party broke up, each to wend his way
homeward to the best of his ability. AT
the corner the atfectionate and somewhat
demonstrative trio parted, and Grey,
taking ziz-zag course, finally reached
the scene of Willie's afternoon labors
The child, whom his mother indolently
supposed had crept stealthily up to his
| bed in the attic, was prolonging his
unnatural slumber, interrupted by lever
ish starts, upon the hard ground, and
thus became the unwilling cause of false
step which sent Grey reeling downward
Gathering himself up as well as he was
able, inwardly bemoaning the inverted
order of the laws of gravltation, he un-
fortunately spied the innocent cause OF his
mishap. By great effort he straight
ened himself, and with well-assumed
dignity, thus issued his commands: 'Git
up-you- young vag-vag-vagabond
you-git up, or III kick the daylights
out of you And as good as his word,
with tremendous force his heavy boot
came down twice or thrice upon the
delicate frame of the sleeping boy.
Screaming with fright and agony, the
child in vain endeavored to rise, while
Mrs. Grey, awakened by his voice, with
an instructive sense of his danger, and
all the mother reused in her long dor
mant soul, rushed out the door. BY the
faint light of the rising moon she dis
cerned the form of her husband, and with
quick intuition OWNED his occupation
What are you doing, you brute My
God, you have murdered the child
Murdered-bah-onl given the lazy
dog little wholesome advice, and his
brutal laugh rung out on the still air.
Lord help ye, John Grey, ye've kilt
him sure, SAID the stern voice Of Patrick
O'Donnahue, steady Irshman whom
the noise had drawn from neighboring
shantee-' an it's the cursed liquor that's
done it. Out upon you We wre,ch-pur-
gatory's too good for you, and lifting the
child tenderly. he carried him into the
cottage and laid him upon the bed.
He had swooned from pain and exhaus-
ton; there he lay, pale and motionless as
death. Grey, now nearly sobered. sat
gazing at him in stupid silence, while
Anna chafed his cold hands, wetting them
with her tears, and Patrick fastened after
surgeon. In the course of half an hour
the fractured limb was bound up, a cool
ing draught administered, and the little
sufferer sank into an uneasy slumber, his
mother watching beside him and his
father sleeping off the remaining fumes
Of the alcohol.
Through the long silent hours of that
wretched night, uncared for by him who
had sworn to love and cherish, sat Anna
Grey; and darker than the shadows which
haunted the corners of the gloomy apart
ment, were the thoughts that tortured
her soul. How sadly memory fingered
round the sunny hillside, the fragrant
clover fields, the grey orchard, where her
young feet had strayed-and that manly
voice that won her maiden heart, was it
the same that had so sickened and mad
dened her this very night! There he
lay--a drunken sot-he whom she had
once loved, and trusted, and reverenced
with all her loving. trusting. woman's
heart--now she loathed, abhorred him
and her home, what was it +? squalid,
miserable spot, where discord reigned
and poverty stared in the face. How diff
ferent from her young imayinings-how
changed from what it was in the first