After a good deal of entreaty, Frank succeeded in prevailing on him to go to bed; in which, however, he failed, until Art had inflicted on him three woful songs, each immensely long, and sung in that peculiarly fascinating drawl, which is always produced by intoxication.  At length, and when the night was more than half spent, he assisted him to bed—­a task of very considerable difficulty, were it not that it was relieved by his receiving from the tipsy man several admirable precepts, and an abundance of excellent advice, touching his conduct in the world; not forgetting religion, on which he dwelt with a maudlin solemnity of manner, that was, or would have been to strangers, extremely ludicrous.  Frank, however, could not look upon it with levity.  He understood his brother’s character and foibles too well, and feared that notwithstanding his many admirable qualities, his vanity and want of firmness, or, in other words, of self-dependence, might overbalance them all.

The next morning his brother Frank was obliged to leave betimes, and consequently had no opportunity of advising or remonstrating with him.  On rising, he felt sick and feverish, and incapable of going into his workshop.  The accession made to his family being known, several of his neighbors came in to inquire after the health of his wife and infant; and as Art, when left to his own guidance, had never been remarkable for keeping a secret, he made no scruple of telling them that he had got drunk the night before, and was, of course, quite out of order that morning.  Among the rest, the first to come in was little Toal Finnigan, who, in addition to his other virtues, possessed a hardness of head—­by which we mean a capacity for bearing drink—­that no liquor, or no quantity of liquor, could overcome.

“Well,” said Toal, “sure it’s very reasonable that you should be out of ordher; after bein’ seven years from it, it doesn’t come so natural to you as it would do.  Howandiver, you know that there’s but the one cure for it—­a hair of the same dog that bit you; and if you’re afeared to take the same hair by yourself, why I’ll take a tuft of it wid you, an’ we’ll dhrink the wife’s health—­my ould sweetheart—­and the little sthranger’s.”

“Throth I believe you’re right,” said Art, “in regard to the cure; so in the name of goodness we’ll have a gauliogue to begin the day wid, an’ set the hair straight on us.”

During that day, Art was neither drunk nor sober, but halfway between the two states.  He went to his workshop about two o’clock; but his journeymen and apprentices could smell the strong whiskey off him, and perceive an occasional thickness of pronunciation in his speech, which a good deal surprised them.  When evening came, however, his neighbors, whom he had asked in, did not neglect to attend; the bottle was again produced, and poor Art, the principle of restraint having now been removed, re-enacted much the same scene as on the preceding night, with this exception only, that he was now encouraged instead of being checked or reproved.