Herald and tribune. [volume] (Jonesborough, Tenn.) 1869-current, 1896-12-02
COLUMN
EDITED BY JoNEsBoRo W. G. t. q.
HIS SHARE OF THE PROFITS.

HIS SHARE OF II PROFITS.
II tell you, Sarah, it would mean
ruin,-absolute, hopeless ruin. That
man doesn't know what he is talking
about. The people of this province ale
not ripe for total abstinence. The traffic
is a necessity, and l might as well have
my share of the profits. If l refuse to
sell l%iquor-the wines that these gen.
tlemen want on their tables-they will
simply deal elsewhere, and we may sell
out and close our DOORS"
The speaker threw off his heavy
overcoat, aud thrusting HE hands into
his pockets, commenced rapidly and
and %nervously to pace the large and
handsome apartment. He and his wife
had just returned to their home, and
she sat still with her seal skin sacaue
and pretty bonnet on like one Ill at
ease with her surroundings.
'But it is so dreadful, "she said, 1.-THE
harm this traffic is doing"
"Oh, those temperance lecturers are
3 ranting lot. Their greatest pleasure
in life is telling the most borrowing
stories"
"Alec. dear, you know as we'll as l
that every word he said was true, only
too true"
Ay, he knew it better than she did.
He stood before her like an animal
driven to bay, a haunted, miserable OK.
preston in his earnest brown eyes.
What would you have me do?" he
said. Say the word and I'll 20 down
this moment and roll my hogsheads into
the gutter-they'r re worth thousands of
dollars-and we shall be beggars, Shall
I-shall 1 do itp"
A little shrek, as a pretty baby es.
capped from his nurse and toddled for.
ward eagerly into his mothers out.
stretched arms. She folded him to hel
heart and laid her gentle cheek upon
his fluffy curls and thought about the
happy life which she had planned fol
him.
Remember, If I do this deed we are
beggars," said the husband and father,
sternly.
Don't be hasty, Alec; let us take a
night to think of it," she murmured.
Next day the mood had changed. 1T
is absurd" he said. IF I don't sell
liquor somebody else will, and l simply
take the food out of my children .
mouths to enrich other people,"
His wife shed many tears over their
cruel p%redicament, but forebore to
urge them, and in future each, by tacit
consent carefully, avoided the temper.
ance lecturers and the total abstinence
agitators.
Business prospered. The children,
two daughters and a son, grew up amid
"all the reinements of a Christian
home" But over in his general gro.
cery," day by day, week by week and
year after year there went on that
deadly distribution whose return was
misery, degradation and death.
"One of our best citizens the town
called Alec Guthrie. for he was a steady
supporter of the church, an earnest
worker in all p%hilathropic and charita
BILE projects, a faithful, true hearted
friend. None deplorcd more deeply
than he the spread of drunkenness
among the young, "the abuse of alco.
hol," as he expressed it.
Total abstinence is not necessary
he would declare. Not at all. Use
a little wine for thy stomach's sake.n
lie did not pretend to be more strict
than st. Paul. He had liquor in his
sideboard constantly, used it himself
with unfailing regularity, and mo n
ever saw me the worse," he would de.
clare with pride.
woe unto MIN That giveth his neigh
Dor drink" says the Word. Possibly
he never saw the warning, Bible stu
dent though he was. Nevertheless woe
was on his track.
More dearly than aught on earth, ex-
cept his wife, Alec Guthrie loved his
only son. And the time came when,
for his sake, wine was banished from
the sideboard and from the house,
when the wine vaults were both kept
locked and guarded; and young Harold
simply dealt elsewhere, buying from
his fathers rival that which had be-
come a necessity to him, and reclining
to his Swallowed home.
Alec Guthrie stormed and threatened: