The Catholic bulletin. [volume] (St. Paul, Minn.) 1911-1995, 1914-01-31
DOMAIN OF TEMPERANCE.
THE MEMORY OF HIS MOTHER.
This story is absolutely true:

his story is absolutely true:
Boys, it seems but yesterday that |
was bare-footed boy at my mothers
knee; wild, reckless, impulsive, mis-
understood and abused by everybody
but her She understood me, and al
though the widest, was her favorite.
My fathers intemperance deprived me
of even the rudiments of school edu-
cation, and when on her death-bed she
said to me: my poor, wild boy, did
you know that your mother was going
to heaven?"
Boys, that was the first great sor-
row of my life. Down on my knees
by her bedside l wept as | had never
wept before. AS l sobbed: Mother,
dear, no one cares for me but you;
no one in all the world but you I'M
derstands me. o, | am afraid I will
go wrong"
How beautiful she looked, her big
brown eyes aswim in tears, her white
curls and her white face on the pill
low, and, as she placed her hand on
my head, she said: Don't cry Johnny,
dear; your mother will meet her boy
Johnny in heaven, if he will give her
promise to take with her"
Il will promise you anything you
ask, mother, and l will try to keep
my promise" Then promise me never
to touch intoxicants, and then it won't
be so hard to leave these two little
sisters in your care"
Boys, gave that promise to mother,
and she went to heaven with a smile
on her face, still holding my hand,
and as God is my Judge, amid all the
temptations of frontier, army or
social life, I have kept that promise,
even when men who were called dad
men" have put a six-shooter in my
face, when they considered it an in
suit to refuse to drink with them. [
have folded my arms, and, looking into
the muzzle of gun, said: you can
shoot and you can kill me, but you
can't make me break a promise that
gave to dying mother"
And I've seen a man who had killed
his man put his six-shooter back in
his belt, take glass of liquor he had
poured out and throw it on the floor,
after I had mentioned that word
mother" then take my hand and say:
"Pard, beg your pardon; l had that
kind of a mother" and walk out of
the saloon. That man is living today
He never took another drink.
AS concluded my story, picked up
the demijohn, and, holding it up, said:
Boys, l said I would drink if you
| insisted, shall I?' Quick as a flash
there was a shot; the demijohn was
shattered; part of the liquor went into
the fire, blue blaze leaped up. Ipulled
my own six-shooter, for I did not see
where the shot came from, when, from
behind the fire and smoke, Bill Wild
stepped out, the smoking pistol still
in his hands and tears on his bronzed
cheeks, as he said:
Nobody can drink when you talk
like that. Say, Jack, that's the kind
of a mother l had back in the sunrise
country. / was jest like you-a wild,
reckless boy. l started wrong when
I smoked my first cigarette as
newsie, then I got to readin' dime
novels, and one time | went to see a
Wild West dime-novel play, with real
western men killing Indians. Later 7
got to drinking, and one day when
crazed with liquor | shot a man and
had to run away. The only consola-
ton my good mother had was that
the man did not die, but never saw
her again. She's up thar with your
mother, and when that shot goes
ringin' through the canons of heaven
she'll hear it, Jack, and it'll tell her
that her wild boy has signed the
pledge at last. There's my hand. I
swear to God an mother an you, I'll
never touch the poison stuff again"
And he never did.