“What are we to do, Mary?  There is no other shop in town,” he said, looking up, after growing a little calm.  “Doesn’t it seem hard, just as I am trying to do right?”

“Don’t despair, Henry.  Let us trust in Providence.  It is only a dark moment; yet, dark as it is, it is brighter to me than any period has been for years.  A clear head and ready hands will not go long unemployed.  I do not despond, dear husband, neither should you.  Keep fast anchored to your pledge, and we will outride the storm.”

“But we shall starve, Mary.  We cannot live upon air.”

“No,” replied Mrs. Gordon; “but we can live upon half what you have been earning at your trade, and quite as comfortably as we have been living.  And it will be an extreme case, I think, if you can’t get employment at five dollars a week, doing something or other.  Don’t you?”

“It appears so.  Certainly I ought to be able to earn five dollars a week, if it is at sawing wood.  I’ll do that—­I’ll do any thing.”

“Then we needn’t be alarmed.  I’ll try and get some sewing at any rate, to help out.  So brighten up, Henry.  All will be well.  It will take a little time to get things going right again; but time and industry will do all for us that we could ask.”

Thus encouraged, Gordon started out to see if he could find something to do.  It was a new thing for him to go in search of work; and rather hard, he felt, to be obliged almost to beg for it.  Where to go, or to whom to apply, he did not know.  After wandering about for several hours, and making several applications at out of the way places with no success, he turned his steps homeward, feeling utterly cast down.  In this state, he was assailed by the temptation to drown all his trouble in the cup of confusion, and nearly drawn aside; but a thought of his wife, and the bright hope that had sprung up in her heart in the midst of darkness, held him back.

“It’s no use to try, Mary,” he said, despondingly, as he entered his poorly-furnished abode, and found his wife busy with her needle.  “I can’t get any work.”

“I have been more successful than you have, Henry,” Mrs. Gordon returned, speaking cheerfully.  “I went to see if Mrs. Hewitt hadn’t some sewing to give out, and she gave me a dozen shirts to make.  So don’t be discouraged.  You can afford to wait for work even for two or three weeks, if it doesn’t come sooner.  Let us be thankful for what we have to-day, and trust in God for to-morrow.  Depend upon it, we shall not want.  Providence never forsakes the man who is trying to do right.”

Thus Mrs. Gordon strove to keep up the spirits of her husband.  After dinner, he went out again and called to see a well-known temperance man.  After relating to him what he had done, and how unhappily he was situated in regard to work, the man said—­

“It won’t do to be idle, Gordon; that’s clear.  An idle man is tempted ten times to another’s once.  You will never be able to keep the pledge unless you get something to do.  We must assist you in this matter.  What can you do besides your trade?”