to stay the fiery ruin.  Oh, no! we must not touch the traffic.  All the dearest and best interests of society may suffer; but the rum-seller must be protected.  He must be allowed to get gain, if the jails and poorhouses are filled, and the graveyards made fat with the bodies of young men stricken down in the flower of their years, and of wives and mothers who have died of broken hearts.  Reform, we are told, must commence at home.  We must rear temperate children, and then we shall have temperate men.  That when there are none to desire liquor, the rum-seller’s traffic will cease.  And all the while society’s true benefactors are engaged in doing this, the weak, the unsuspecting, and the erring must be left an easy prey, even if the work requires for its accomplishment a hundred years.  Sir! a human soul destroyed through the rum-seller’s infernal agency, is a sacrifice priceless in value.  No considerations of worldly gain can, for an instant, be placed in comparison therewith.  And yet souls are destroyed by thousands every year; and they will fall by tens of thousands ere society awakens from its fatal indifference, and lays its strong hand of power on the corrupt men who are scattering disease, ruin, and death, broadcast over the land!

“I always get warm on this subject,” he added, repressing his enthusiasm.  “And who that observes and reflects can help growing excited?  The evil is appalling; and the indifference of the community one of the strangest facts of the day.”

While he was yet speaking, the elder Mr. Hammond came in.  He looked wretched.  The redness and humidity of his eyes showed want of sleep, and the relaxed muscles of his face exhaustion from weariness and suffering.  He drew the person with whom I had been talking aside, and continued an earnest conversation with him for many minutes—­often gesticulating violently.  I could see his face, though I heard nothing of what he said.  The play of his features was painful to look upon, for every changing muscle showed a new phase of mental suffering.

“Try and see him, will you not?” he said, as he turned, at length, to leave the office.

“I will go there immediately,” was answered.

“Bring him home, if possible.”

“My very best efforts shall be made.”

Judge Hammond bowed and went out hurriedly.

“Do you know the number of the room occupied by the man Green?” asked the gentleman, as soon as his visitor had retired.

“Yes.  It is No. 11.”

“Willy has not been home since last night.  His father, at this late day, suspects Green to be a gambler.  The truth flashed upon him only yesterday; and this, added to his other sources of trouble, is driving him, so he says, almost mad.  As a friend, he wishes me to go to the ‘Sickle and Sheaf,’ and try and find Willy.  Have you seen any thing of him this morning?”

I answered in the negative.

“Nor of Green?”