The Daily state journal. [volume] (Alexandria, Va.) 1868-1874, 1871-03-24
TEM PERANCE.

amongst us who indulge in the social glass
thoughtlessly. 1t gives them no real
pleasure, but among their friends it is GUS
tomary to treat, and so they conform aud
drink. They would be shocked aud dis
gusted at the thought of being drunk, and
top off glass Of liquor without thought.
Yet of any one hundred young men who
have formed this habit, we may assert pos
tively that sixty will die drunkards if they
do not stop drinking altogether. The rates
of drunkard-making are figured as acurate-
ly as the mortality rates of the Life Insur-
ance companies. Against all the conf
dence that our young men feel in their self
command, against their assertions that they
.'can drink or let it alonc,' stand the ter
rible statistics of drunkenness. We have
seen our bravest, our best and noblest, sue
cumb to the Demon of Intemperance.- -
Who is safe when our mighty ones have
fallen
We commend to the serious attention OF
every young man, and every temperate
drinker, the following sketch of two men
of the brightest ornaments Of their re-
spective States twenty years ago. Both
men, whom the people delighted to honor,
they were elected to the United States Sem
ate, and now leave it to go down to the
gloom of drunka-d's grave
YATES AND SALISBURY.
A w washington correspondent of the Brook
lyn Mirror refers to The better characteristics
Of the senators especially notorious for inc
briefly iu a manner at once charitable, tender
and fleeing:
With senator Salisbury will vanish one Of
| the most memorable faces and forms of the
| Senate. On the Democratic side of the Senate
| he is the grand figure head, as Chas. Sumner
| is on the Republican. Not to see Salisbury
| with his hands deep in his pockets, glowering
up and down behind the last tier of senatorial
chairs, restive and defiant as Gagged lion, but
his pale. trim, temperate brother 'Eli', in his
seat, will be to see new Senate. To look
upon, he Is a great leonine man, noble to be-
hold, though he does chew tobacco and
mock with strong drink. l have seen
him on the street corner exchanging "chews"
on terms of perfect hail fellow equality with
one OF the despised race, which be ragged over
the next day in the Senate as very little above
that of the bab ON. have seen him empty
his stomach in the gutter and then drop down
and lie in it. and have seen him one of the
grandest looking of men, clad in faultless black
and spotless linen, walking beside Mrs. Jeffer-
son Davis on fair jane sabbath (Which her
husband spent at Fortress Monroe) gallantly
and devoutly carrying her prayer book to
by his side the days of his boyhood, when be
and "Ei'' played ia the old barn and slept in
one bed. and each told the other all his
heart, each loved the other SO much that they
couldn't quarrel. And in this recital there were
touches OF generous nature which told that
God made this man, in the beginning, loving
and noble. He stands more til six feet high,
and is large in proportion. His head is COW
cred with abundant black hair, just touched
with silver. He has black eyes, and finely cut
features, and, when he is himself, most win
ming expression. In early lite he studied for
the Epi-copal ministry, and even now, when
he assumes the "white choker," as he often
Yates, on the 4th of March, depart the last of
the inebIiste Senators. There may be plenty
of "drinkers" left, but no other ''drunkards."
"Poor Dick Yates" as his brethren so often
called him. Probably never did living man
battle harder than be has done with an over
mastering appetite. An Inherited one, bern
in his blood, no one not thus cursed can dream
of the power of such foe, nor judge by the
right the sin of the soul that at last sinks van
quished. Brave, generous, and cbidh hearted
-as the victim of the wine cup often is-llli
nois loved this, her favorite son, loved him for
himself aud for all that he had done for his
native State; trusted him, bore with him,
trusted him again-even when through weak
ness of the will he oft betrayed her faith.
How he struggled to be worthy of that trust in
the highest legislative council of the nation,
he only knows, and his God. But there came
an hour when it was TOO late; when affection,
intellect and will went down forever before
the insatiate foe. and Richard Yates, but the
wreck of himself, o.day trembling in his seat,
counts the days when his place will be filled by
another.