Year: 1867

Inc Late Senator McD0ugal.


The following sketch is from the
Editors Easy Chair in Harper's
Monthly for November: eova


In the early summer of this year
there was seen for a few days strik-
ing figure upon a pleasant balcony
or piazza of Congress Hall in Al,
bany. There sat a small man, ap-
parently shrivelled or withered, the
slightness of his form emphasized by
huge broad brimmed plantation
hat. He was bent or curled over as
he sat, and smoked a long pipe-sc
long that he was obliged to hold the
wooden stem in his hand as if it had
been chibonque, and he was always
alone. He seemed to know no one
and to care to make no acquaintances.
Apparently he muttered a great deal
TO himself, as it rapt and unconscious
ly talking. But the murmur was in
articulate. 1t seemed a forlorn, gro
tesque cid man, living in reverie.-
But when he arose his step was ua-
certain. He moved toward the din
lngrOOm in the same self-involved
manner, and it became too plain that
it was man wholly besotted with
drink. At the table there was the
same muttering; stupid wonder that
the walters did not come; a peevish
lmpatience, an abrupt stalking away
from the room before he had half
eaten his dinner


Then if forgetting the sad specta-
Gle of a ruined man, some mus;ng
loiterer upon the balcony could have
looked through the trees of the dusky
square down into the Albany of thir-
ty or forty years ago, be might have
seen an eager, intelligent lad, earnest
in study, ardent in friendship, gener-
Gus, aspiring, ambitious, with a spark
ling and persuasive tongue, and a
brilliant career smiling upon him
from the luture. Later he might have
followed the youth to the other side
of the continent, where the promise
seemed to be partly fulfilled, and he
rose to high civic honors. Yet upon
broader and more conspicuous plat
form that promise was wholly ecIipsed,
aud the bright, studiouS boy became
u man whose presence was a sadden-
ing spectacle. and whose name was a
by-word. He had grown to be ma
tlonal humiliation; and such was the
wreck and state Of manhood that
there were many who asked as they
had never asked beIore-can nothing
be done by law to prevent this terri
ble ruin which seems to lie in wait for
any man ?


When he sat upon the balcony of
Congress Hall he held no public posi-.
tioH-he commanded no respect. Ii
was pititul to see him crouched under
the broad brim of his hat and to think
that, as he silently smoked, he too
looked through the trees of the dusky
/ square down into the town and saw
the rosy, eager, hopeful boy Of thirty
or forty years ago, and then thought
OF the horrible incubus which had
4 gnawed his life and career away, and
which he could never hope to throw
off Nobody spoke to hint was
useless; but he was too tragical a
sight to smile at. Yet this old man
as he seemed, this prematurely with
cred frame OF seventy, was only forty.
eigat years old.


AT the end OF the summer, in early
September, if you were coming W
State street one warm afternoon, you
would have seen several carriage,
and a hearSe before st. Peter,
church. The generous, hopeful boy
the ruined man-was dead. The
service was read, and amidst the
warm tears of those who loved hin
he was borne away. There was ne
address, no sermon. What could be
said +? Tne one great appalling fac
of his lite-could that be -nentioneC
as a warning over his coffin =? AnC
if it were not mentioned what elst
could be thought of? The prayers
were said in the church, which wa.
as gloomy and depressing as oul
Gothic churches generally are; bu
there was no sermon. The life, The
death, these were the most solemn
and impressive of sermons.