The Londonderry sifter. (South Londonderry, Vt.) 1883-19??, 1891-03-12
THE LONDONDERRY SITTER,

will be the relief of the working classes
and the salvation of the nation. win
undertake to say that there is not a
healthy laborer in the United States
who, within the next twenty years, if
he will refuse all intoxicating beverages
and be saving, may not become CAPT,
talist on a small scale.
Oil how many are waiting to see if
something cannot be done for the stop
ping of intemperancel Thousands of
drunkards waiting who cannot go ten
minutes in any direction without hav-
ing the temptation glaring before their
eyes or appealing to their nostrils, they
fighting against it with enfeebled will
and diseased appetite, conquering, then
surrendering, conquering again and sur
rendering again, and crying, "How
long, o Lord how low before these in
famous solicitations shall be gone"
And how many mothers are waiting to
see if this national curse cannot lift2
Oh, is that the boy who had the honest
breath who comes home with breath
vitiated or disguised2 What changed
How quickly those habits of early com
ing home have been exchanged for the
rafting of the night key in the door
long after the last Waterman has gone
by and tried to see that everything was
closed up for the night!
Obi what a change for that young
man who we had hoped would do some.
thing in merchandise, or in artisanship,
or in profession that would do honor
to the family name long after mothers
wrinkled hands are folded from the
last toll All that exchanged for
startled look when the door bell rings,
lest something has happened; and the
wish that the scarlet fever twenty years
ago had been fatal, for then he would
have gone directly to the bosom of his
Saviour. But alas! poor old soul, she
has lived to experience what Solomon
said, "a foolish son is a heaviness to
bis mother
THE STRICKEN MOTHERS WOE.
OH what funeral it will be when
that boy is brought home dead And
how mother will sit there and say: SIS
this my boy that l used to fondle and
that l walked the floor with in the
night when he was sick9 Is this the
boy that held to the baptismal font
for baptism? Is this the boy for whom
l toiled, until the blood burst from the
tips of my fingers, that he might have
good start and a good home2 Lord,
why hast thou let me live to see this
Can it be that these swollen hands are
the ones that used to wander over my
face when rocking him to sleep? Can
it be that this swollen brow is that |
once so rapturously kissed9 Poor boy
how tired he does look! wonder who
struck him that blow across the tenn
ples2 l wonder if he uttered dying
prayer9 Wake up, my son; don't you
hear me? wake up Oil he can't hear
me- Dead dead dead! % Absa-
lom, my son, my son, would God that
l had died for thee, o Absalom, my
son, my sonp"
am not much of mathematician,
and | cannot estimate it, but is there
any one here quick enough at figures
to estimate how many mothers there
are waiting for something to be donei
Ay, there are many wives waiting for
domestic rescue. He promised some
thing different from that whes, after
the long acquaintance and the careful
scrutiny of character, the hand and
the heart were offered and accepted.
What hell on earth woman lives in
who has drunken husband! O Death,
how lovely thou art to her, and how
soft and warm thy skeleton hand! The
sepulcher at midnight in winter is a
kings drawing room compared with
that woman's home. 1t is not so much
the blow on the head that hurts as the
blow on the heart. The rum fiend
came to the door of that beautiful
home, and opened the door and stood
there and said: 81 curse this dwelling
with an unrelenting curse. I curse that
father into maniac, l curse that
mother into a pauper. curse those
SONS into vagabonds. 1 curse those
daughters into proffigacy. Cursed be
bread tray and cradle. Cursed be couch
and chair and family Bible, with record
of marriages and births and deaths.
Curse upon curse"
Oh, how many wives are there wait
ing to see if something cannot be done
to shake these frosts of the second
death off the orange blossoms! Yea,
God is waiting, the God who works
through human instrumentalities, wait
ing to see whether this nation is going
to overthrow this evil; and if it refuse
to do so God will wipe out the nation
as he did Phenicia, as he did Rome, as
he did Thebes, as he did Babylon
Aye, he is waiting to see what the
church of God will do. If the churcl
does not do its work then he will wipt
it out as he did the church of Ephesus
church of Thyatira, church of Sardis
| The Protestant and Roman Catholic
churches today stand side by side witt
an impotent look gazing on this evil
which costs this country more than {
billion dollars a year to take care o
the 800, 900 paupers, and the 315, 00l
criminals, and the 80, 900 idiots, and t.
bury the Is, 900 drunkards. Protagora
boosted that out of the sixty years o
his life forty years he had spent in ruin
ing youth; but this evil may make tn
more infamous boast that all it's life i
has been running the bodies minds ant
souls of the human race
UNFATTHFULNEsS OF POLITICAL PAR
| TIES.
| Put on your spectacles and take
candle and examine the platforms o
the two leading political parties of thi
country, and see what they are doinl
for the arrest of this evil and for tn
overthrow of this abomination. Reso
lutions2 Oh, yes, resolutions abou
Mormonisln 1t is safe to attack tina
organized nastiness two thousand mile
away. But not one resolution agains
drunkenness, which would turn thi
entire nation into one bestial Salt LAX