The Morristown gazette. [volume] (Morristown, Tenn.) 1867-1920, 1880-03-24

Have you been sending Jack Styles
OFF to prison?" asked Starbuck's wife as
he entered the house.
Yes, and I'm going to send every
other scamp that won't pay me to the
same place. I have got to raise some
money to pay off this mortgage, or /
I shall be turned out of house and home,
and you, too, he replied.
"Well, this man looks like an honest
kind of fellow. How much does he owe
you2"
%Twenty dollars, or So"
"NOt enough to pay your liquor bill
one week" thought his wife; but she
! said nothing, as she dreaded to arouse
his temper, which might, when fully
under way, be compared to hurricane
or any other dangerous element. That
afternoon she sent boy with a large
basket full of eatables to Jacks family,
for she had heard they were very poor,
and continued so to do every week
while Jack was in prison.
After Jack was released he found
plenty of work, and had many presents
given him by those who, knowing his
honesty, had been thoroughly indignant
at such treatment of him. So he man
aged to get along after that, and was
able to pay all his debts.
Fifteen years later, and Jack Styles,
now a man of 55, and his son, a fine
looking, promising young man of 25,
were doing fair business in the gro
Gerry line, in the city of W, about
twenty miles from their former home.
So honorable were the dealings of this
firm with all their customers that after
they were once established in business
which at first was on q small scale, they
found their receipts month by month
increasing in a way that was very en-
couraging. Young Styles stood at the
head of the concern, as Jack had very
little education; still the latter made
himself extremely useful in various
ways about the store. After they had
been about two years in business, Young
Styles one day said to his father: You
remember Old Starbuck who once shut
you up in iail?"
q I rather think do" replied Jack,
with a shudder.
"Well, he is living in this city on
charity; he has spent his property, and |
drank himself almost to death, making |
him one of the most bloated, disagreea-
ble-looking objects you ever saw"
"Is his wife iving?" asked Mrs.
Styles. "If she is I viii surely go to
see her, and help her if she is in need"
Il hope you will, said both Jack and
his son, in breath. Il think you will
find her on A street, one the vilest
in the city"
"If it is such dangerous street you
must go with me Jack. I would not like
to go there alone"
Indeed, viii" ," he replied.
So as soon as they had eaten dinner
hey set out for the house of Jacks old
enemy, and after an hours search found
he old tippler and his wife in one of
he meanest tenements of the city. Star
buck did not recognize Jack, for he was
hen suffering from a fit of delirium
remens, and hardly knew one person
rom another, but his wife at once called
lin by name, seemed delighted to see
lim, and her thanks for the presents he
arried her, which consisted in a good
upply of the choicest articles his grocery
tore afforded, were unbOunded. But
10Th Jack and his wife assured her this
vas not the last of their gifts to her,
nd they left her in apparently better
pirits than they found her.
In few days Starbuck died, and
hen Jack and his wife took his widow {
o their own comfortable home, where, {
to the wishes of both, she ,
pent the remainder of her life, which
7as not many years. She was lady of
reat culture, having been brought up | J
nd accustomed to move in the best {
ircles of society, and at the time she {
\ "a ,at~ no To- h | 7
tanding and possessed of much wealth,
ut through the baleful effects of liquor &
e was brought down to poverty and {
isgrace, while Jack, from leading a
industrious, honest life, was
rought up from small beginnings to a
omfortable, respectable position '
T1TJvr