In the afternoon a lot of fellows came in,
and he stood champagne like water to the whole gang. At six o'clock I
wanted him to have a cup of tea, but he said, 'I've had nothing but
booze for three days.' Then he got on to the floor, and said he was
catching rats--so we knew he'd got 'em on.[1] At night he came out and
cleared the street with his sword-bayonet; and it's a wonder he didn't
murder somebody. It took two to hold him down all night, and he had his
last fit at six in the morning. Died screaming!" A burst of laughter
hailed the climax, and then one appreciative friend remarked, "He was a
fool--I suppose he was drunk eleven months out of the last twelve." This
was the epitaph of a bright young athlete who had been possessed of
health, riches, and all fair prospects. No one warned him; none of those
who swilled expensive poisons for which he paid ever refused to accept
his mad generosity; he was cheered down the road to the gulf by the
inane plaudits of the lowest of men; and one who was evidently his
companion in many a frantic drinking-bout could find nothing to say but
"He was a fool!" At this moment there are thousands of youths in our
great towns and cities who are leading the heartless, senseless,
semi-delirious life of the bar, and every possible temptation is put in
their way to draw them from home, from refinement, from high thoughts,
from chaste and temperate modes of life.
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