“Aint you well, Mr. Graves,” he at length asked, breaking in upon the rum-seller’s painful reverie.

“Well!” he ejaculated, rousing up with a start.  “No, I am not well.”

“What is the matter, sir?”

“I’m sick,” was the evasive response.

“How, sick?” was Sandy’s persevering inquiry.

“Sick at heart!  O, dear!  I wish I’d been dead before I opened a grog-shop!”—­And the countenance of Mr. Graves changed its quiet, sad expression, to one of intense agony.

Sandy looked at the tavern-keeper with an air of stupid astonishment for some moments, unable to comprehend his meaning.  It was evident to his mind that Mr. Graves had suddenly become crazed about something.  This idea produced a feeling of alarm, and he was about retiring for counsel and assistance, when the tavern-keeper roused himself and said: 

“When did you see Bill Riley, Sandy?”

“I saw him yesterday.”

“Are you certain?” in a quick, eager tone.

“O yes.  I saw him going along on the other side of the street with two or three fellows that didn’t look no how at all like rum-bruisers.”

“I was afraid he was dead,” Mr. Graves responded to this, breathing more freely.

“Dead!  Why should you think that?” inquired Sandy, still more (sic) mistified.

“I had reason for thinking so,” was the evasive reply.  A pause of some, moments ensued, when the bar-keeper said—­

“I shall have to be stirring bright and early to-morrow morning.”

“Why so?”

“We’re out of sugar and lemons both.  That Sub-Treasury runs on them ’ere articles strong.”

“Confound the Sub-Treasury!” Mr. Graves ejaculated, with a strong and bitter emphasis.  Sandy stood again mute with astonishment, staring into the tavern-keeper’s face.

“Sandy,” Mr. Graves at length said in a calm, resolute tone, “my mind is made up to quit selling liquor.”

“Quit selling liquor, sir!” exclaimed Sandy, more astonished than ever.  “Quit selling liquor just at this time, when you have made such a hit?”

“Yes, Sandy, I’m going to quit it.  I’m afraid that we rum-sellers are on the side of hell.”

“I never once supposed that we were on the side of heaven,” the bar-keeper replied, half smiling.

“Then what side did you suppose we were on?”

“O, as to that, I never gave the matter a thought.  Only, it never once entered my head that we could claim much relationship with heaven.  Heaven feeds the hungry and clothes the naked.  But we take away both food and clothing, and give only drink.  There is some little difference in this, now one comes to think about it.”

“Then I am right in my notion.”

“I’m rather afraid you are, sir.  But that’s a strange way of thinking.”

“Aint it the true way?”

“Perhaps so.”

“I am sure so, Sandy!  And that’s what makes me say that I’m done selling rum.”