"How do you know?"

"Oh! I've met him there myself several times, and I think Mary prefers him; so she may have him. I'm going West."

"West?"

"Yes; I have a chance to go the overland route to Idaho with a train which starts soon, and I think I'll go and seek my fortune."

Ralph spoke drearily, though with a laugh. Marian's heart was deeply touched. She knew how much Mary had been to Ralph for many years. It was his first boyish passion, but he had never outgrown it in the least, as so many young men do, and Marian feared he never would. She hardly knew what to think of Mary, who had a natural fondness for flirting which was very hard to overcome. Marian had her doubts, too, about Mary's being very fond of Ralph, though she had given him every encouragement now for some time.

"Have you ever spoken to Mary, Ralph ? Perhaps she does not know."

"Oh! she knows well enough, though I have never said anything directly. Didn't you know about Arnold before he said a word?"

"Yes, I think I always knew about Arnold," she laughed," and he about me. We did n't have to say anything."

"And Mary knows just as well. So what's the use of speaking and getting sent away; for I'm sure she would send me away."

"I am not. Mary is n't like me; she would n't

take things for granted. Perhaps she resents it a little that you do not ask for her, if you want her." "Well, I think I'll go West, and give her a chance to take somebody else, if she wants to. She had better decide that now than later."

Then Margaret and Mason came driving up, and were rallied on the lateness of the hour.

"It's a good way out to the lake," they cried. "And the horse went very slowly," put in Ralph. "It's a poor horse, anyhow. Why didn't you get Margaret's beast, that was 'shod with fire'?"

"This one suits us very well," called out Mason as he drove away. "We are rather slow in our

tastes."

CHAPTER XIV.

POOR JOE.

THE next evening they were all in the house around the piano, when they heard just outside a piercing shriek of "Murder!" Frightened in a terrible manner, they looked for an instant at each other, dazed, and hardly knowing what to do. The shriek was followed almost instantly by another and another: "Murder, murder! Help, help!" Ralph rushed to the door, followed by Arnold and Mason; and even after they had gone out, the shrieks kept up in the most terrific manner. In a moment Mr. Mason returned, saying: "Ralph wishes me to tell you it is Joe, and says that he and Mr. Arnold will take him home. Joe is crazy with drink, and you are not to worry if Ralph does not come back to-night."

66

'Oh, Joe! poor Joe! has it really come to this?" said Margaret, beginning to cry.

"And who is Joe?"

His

"Joe was one of the boys in school with us. father died from excess in drink a few years ago, and we tried to save Joe from the same fate; but I'm afraid we have failed," said Marian.

"He has been sober a long time," said Margaret, "and was working on the railroad and doing very

well, when some of his old chums thought it would be great fun to see Joe drunk again, after all his fine resolutions; and they almost carried him into Marcy's one night, and would n't let him off till he had drunk just once. They knew what that meant better than he did. Joe is very good-natured, and not very strong-willed, and he drank with them,more than once too. Then he broke away from them and ran to Mr. Arnold's room, where he thought he would be safe.

"Mr. Arnold had got him the fireman's place, and Joe thought he could help him if any one could. He asked Mr. Arnold to lock him up and not let him out till he had forgotten the taste of the liquor. Mr. Arnold did lock him in a chamber, but he grew so desperate with his awful desire for drink that he jumped out of the window and ran to the grocery, where he did not stop drinking till he was dead drunk. Of course he lost his place, and that made him worse."

"Poor fellow! How long ago was this?"

"Only a few weeks. And Ralph and Mr. Arnold have done everything to help him since. But he says it's no use; he can't fight the battle over again, and should fall again even if he did. So he just drinks every day, and only works enough to buy liquor."

"What punishment is bad enough for those who tempted him?" said Mr. Mason, hot with indignation.

"I think everlasting punishment might be!" said

Marian; "anything else would be ridiculously inadequate."

"Now, Mrs. Boythorn," cried Margaret, smiling through her tears, "what a good thing it is that you do not order these things!"

"Indeed, it is a good thing for such miscreants! I would flay them alive, then have them drawn and quartered! But that would be only a pin-prick beside what they deserve!"

"You are pretty hard on them, Marian," said Mason, "but not too hard. I feel, as you do, that human punishments do not fit the case."

"They will be punished enough," said Margaret. "Be not deceived; God is not mocked for whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap.'

"That is a dreadful text," said Mason; "but I always thought that other one even more dreadful: The same measure ye mete unto others shall be measured to you again,' if that is quoted right. That has an element of terror in it even for moderate offenders."

"Yes," said Marian; "but the most awful text in all the Scriptures is the one that says 'The sins of the fathers shall be visited upon the children to the third and fourth generation.' Poor Joe is lying under that curse now, and there are thousands of others. It seems enormously wicked to me, even if God did say it."

"Oh, Marian, you must not!"

"But I can't help it. Think of poor little children, helpless and innocent, suffering the consequences of