Number Ten. SEED TIME AND HARVEST. FOUNDED ON FACT. Ninth Edition. iioston: PUBLISHED BY WHIFFLE AND DAMRELL, No. 9 Cornhttl. NEW YORK : - SCOFIELD AND VOORHIES, No. 118 Nassau Street. 1838. TO THE READER. IN this last number -of the second volume of our Temperance Tales, we offer you a short and simple narrative, which produced a very deep and lasting im pression upon a group of three or four of us, as it was related, certainly in the most natural and touching manner, by the son of a drunken father. We have added paragraph to paragraph, with a growing convic tion of our utter inability to imitate the voice of nature. As the story is a brief one, it shall not be disfigured by a tedious preface. If, by God's blessing, it shall be the means of dispelling wretchedness from some humble dwelling, if it shall cause a single drunkard to reform, and bless the Lord, who giveth SEED TIME AND HARVEST, we shall never regret that we have be stowed our labors in the field. Entered according to Act of Congress in the year 1835, by WILLIAM 8. DAMRELL, in the Clerk's Office of the District Court of Massachusetts SEED TIME AND HARVEST. IT must be nearly midnight, thought 1, as I walked rapidly along. I had travelled full fourteen miles. The rain descended in tor rents; and, finding ready admittance, at a farmer's barn, I climbed upon a hay-mow, and threw myself down, thoroughly wet, weary, and sleepless. What an awful visitor it is, thought I, at the poor cottager's fire side ! How forcible and true are the words of Holy Writ ! If wine be " a mocker," in the castles of the rich, among the habita tions of the poor, " strong drink is raging." There was I, at the age of sixteen, turning my back upon my birth-place, upon my home, upon a mother and sister, whom I tenderly loved. As the recollection of all they had endured already, and the anticipation of their 4 SEED TIME AND HARVEST. 234 future sufferings rushed upon my mind, I had almost resolved to return: but, alas! what could I oppose to the ungovernable fury of an unkind husband and an apostate father ! No, thought I, I will fly from that, which I can neither prevent nor endure. I will seek my bread among strangers. By the kind providence of Him, who hath promised to be the Father of the fatherless, and such, in real ity, I am, I may win, by honest industry, the means of bringing comfort to her, who bore me, when my father's intemperance and prod igality shall have made havoc of all that re mains ; and when the last acre of the home stead shall have passed into the rum-seller's hands. My resolution was fixed. Sleep was gathering over my eyelids. I got upon my knees to commit myself to God in prayer. I could scarcely give form to my scattered thoughts; it seemed, under the condition of high excitement, in which I then was, that my father was before me, enraged at my de parture, and demanding who had taught me to pray. It was he himself, who first set me 235 SEED TIME AND HARVEST. 5 upon my knees, and placed my infant hands together, and put right words into my mouth, and bade me ask of God to put right thoughts into my heart. How often had he led his little household in morning and evening pray er! How often, as we walked to God's house, in company together, had he led the way ! How constantly, m our daily labors, had he conducted our thoughts to serious con templation, by some sensible and devout al lusion to those employments, in which we were engaged ! Lost and gone, degraded and changed he was ; but he had been once a kind father, a tender husband, a generous neighbor, a faithful friend, a pious and a pro fessing Christian. Rum and ruin, hand in hand, had entered our dwelling together. The peace of our fire side was gone. The rurn-seller had laid my poor, misguided father, under the bonds of an unrelenting and fatal appetite ; he had won away the little children's bread ; and convert ed our once-happy home into an earthly hell, whose only portal of exit was the silent grave. 6 SEED TIME AND HARVEST. 236 it was very evident to me, that we were going to destruction. My father's interest in the welfare of us all was at an end. Debts were accumulating fast. His farm was heav ily mortgaged. His habits, long before, had compelled the church to exclude him from the communion ; and the severest abuse was the certain consequence, whenever my poor, old mother went singly to the table of her Lord. I could have borne my father's harsh treatment of myself and of my poor sister Rachel ; but he returned home, at last, con stantly intoxicated; and, when opposed in any thing, proceeded to swear, and rave, and break the furniture, and abuse my old mother, who bore it all, with the patience of a saint ; I made up my mind, that I could stand it no longer. I waited cautiously, for a favorable oppor tunity, and asked my father's permission to go to sea. He flew into a terrible rage. The next morning he seemed to be in a bet ter frame of mind, and, as I was chopping wood before the door, he asked me, of his 237 SEED TIME AND HARVEST. 7 own accord, what had induced me to wish to leave home, and go to sea. I hesitated, for some time ; but, as he urged me to speak out, and ; at the same time, appeared to be much calmer than usual ; " Father," said I. " it kills me to see you and hear you talk and act so badly to poor mother." He flew into a greater rage than before, and bade me nev er open my mouth upon the subject again. Thus matters continued to progress from bad to worse. Love is said not to stand still. This saying is manifestly true in regard to the love of strong drink. Our domestic misery continued to increase, from week to week. There were intervals, in which, my father was more like himself, more like the good, kind parent and husband, whose outgoings, in the morning, had been a source of affectionate regret, and whose in comings, at night, had been a subject of joy to the wife of his bosom and the children of his loins. I have seen the faint smile of sat isfaction brighten upon my poor mother's pale features, upon such occasions; and I 8 SEED TIME AND HARVEST. 238 have marked the sigh, half suppressed, which told ., the secret of an agonized spirit, and which seemed to say, How precious, how brief is this little interval of joy ! It was indeed like the parting sunbeam, the last, lingering light of a summer day, which plays upon the cold grave, where the treasure and the heart are destined to slum ber together. In such an example of domestic wretched ness as ours, the operation of cause and ef fect was perfectly intelligible. Rum excited into action all that was contentious, in the nature of my parent. A keen perception of his own blameworthiness, notwithstanding the stupefying tendency of the liquor he had drunken, increased the irritability of his tem per. A word, look, or gesture, from any member of the household, which indicated the slightest knowledge of his unhappy con dition, when he returned, at night, under the influence of strong drink, was surely inter preted into an intentional affront. He would often anticipate reproof; and, as it were, re- 239 SEED TIME AND HARVEST. 9 pay it beforehand, by the harshness of his manners. The habit of drinking, which is invariably the prolific mother of sin and sloth, wretch edness and rags, is sure to be maintained and kept alive, by the beggarly progeny, to which it has given birth. Whenever my unhappy father was dunned for the interest on his mortgage, or any other debt, which, at last, he had no means to pay, he was in the hab it, almost mechanically, as soon as the cred itor had departed, of turning to the jug of rum, for relief and oblivion. The gloom and ill-nature, which had hith erto been occasionally interspersed with ex hibitions of kindlier feelings to us all, ap peared to have become unvarying and fixed. There was less and less, from week to week, of an April sky. All was chill and drear, like November. One evening, my mother and sister had been busily engaged, as usual, in such housewifery, as might best contribute to keep our poor wreck of a domicil together, as long as possible. I had learned to write a 10 SEED TIME AND HARVEST. 240 fair hand, and was engaged in copying some papers, for our squire, who paid me, by the sheet . It had gotten to be nearly ten o'clock,. My mother put on her spectacles, and, open ing the Bible, began to read. Rachel and I sat by the fire, listening to the words of truth and soberness. My poor mother had fallen upon a portion of Scripture, which, from its applicability to her own situation and that of her children, had affected her feelings, and the tears were in her eyes, when the loud tramp upon the door step announced the re turn of my father. His whole appearance was unusually ominous of evil. My mother stirred the fire, and I placed him a chair, which he kicked over, and threw himself down upon the bed, and called for supper. Mother told him, in a gentle manner, that there was nothing in the house but some bread. He told her she lied, and swore ter ribly. She sat silently by the fire ; I look ed up in her face : She wept, but said noth ing. " Don't cry so, dear mother," said Rachel. "Wife," said my father, sitting 241 SEED TIME AND HARVEST. 11 upon the edge of the bed, "when will you leave off crying ? " " Whenever you leave off drinking, husband/' replied my mother in the kindest manner. My father sprang up, in a hurricane of wrath, and with a dreadful oath, hurled a chair, at my mother's head. I sprang forward, and received its full force upon my shoulder. Rachel and my mother fled to a neighbor's house, and my father struck me several blows with his feet and fists ; and, as 1 made my escape, I left him dashing the furniture to pieces, with the fury of a madman. I rushed forth to seek shelter amid the driving storm from the tempest of a drunken father's wrath. I went, as speedi ly as possible, to the squire's house, and beg ged him to take compassion on my poor mother and sister. Having received his prom ise, that he would go instantly over to our cottage, I took the resolution, which I have already stated. After I had passed a comfortless night, in the farmer's barn, I pushed forward to the city. I had a trifle of change in my pocket ; 12 SEED TIME AND HARVEST. 242 I bought a biscuit of a travelling baker, and I had no relish for any other than the beverage of God's appointment, which was near at hand. When I reached the city, I directed my course to one of the wharves, and found no difficulty, as I was unusually stout for my years, in obtaining a voyage, as a green hand, in a ship bound to China. Three days passed, before the ship sailed. I wrote to my mother and sister, bidding them keep up their spirits, and put their trust, as I did, in the God of the widow and the fatherless, for such, and even worse, was our condition. I asked them to say to father, when he was sober, that, although I scarcely expected to see him again in this world, I freely forgave all his ill-treatment to myself. I worked hard and strove to please the captain. I soon found that ploughing the sea was a very different affair from ploughing the land. I had a good constitution, and a cheerful temper. I had been taught, at all times, by my dear mother, and by my poor, unhappy father also, till he became intern- 243 SEED TIME AND HARVEST. 13 perate, to put the fullest confidence in the promises of God. When we arrived in Chi na, though we had shipped out and home, the voyage was broken up, and the ship sold. The captain settled with the crew to their entire satisfaction ; and I shall always be grateful for his kindness to me. He got me a voyage to England. I laid out my wages, by his advice. I could not have followed a shrewder counsellor. He was born and bred, so far as regards his land learning, in one of the most thrifty villages in Connecticut. We had a most boisterous voyage from Canton to Liverpool ; but, whenever I pulled a rope, 1 always pulled a little harder for the sake of my old mother and sister Rachel. I had < saved every penny of my wages, that I could lay by, and my little investment in Canton turned out far beyond my expectations. I do not think I was avaricious ; but I felt it to be my duty, under existing circumstances, to save my earnings for my honored mother. Nevertheless, I felt myself authorized to in dulge in one luxury at least ; so, upon my 14 SEED TIME AND HARVEST. 244 arrival in Liverpool, I went into the first bookstore and bought me a pocket Bible. Five years had now gone by, in which I had sailed many thousands of miles, and vis ited various corners of the world. During this period, I had gotten together a larger sum of money, than I ever expected to pos sess at twenty-one; besides having made several remittances to the squire, for my old mother's use, to whom I wrote upon every convenient opportunity. They all came to hand, as I afterward learned, saving one, in gold, which went to bottom, with poor Tom Johnson, who was lost at sea. If I was for tunate enough to save my hard earnings, just let me say, for the advantage of every brother sailor, that there are four things, which I never did ; I never suffered a drop of grog to go down my hatches, blow high or blow low; 1 never rolled a stinking weed, like a sweet morsel, under my tongue ; I never crossed hands with a drunken landlord ; and I never bore away from a poor fellow, whose hammock was harder than my own. 245 SEED 1IME AND HARVEST. 15 My five years' absence from home might have extended to fifty, but for many recol lections of my mother and sister, which be came more forcible, from day to day. My remembrance of my father was of the most painful character: the very recollection of his tenderness, in the days of my childhood, which often brought tears into my eyes, served only to render the image of a cruel and degraded parent more frightful and re volting. I had shipped, about this time, on board the Swiftsure, from London to Oporto. One afternoon, two or three of us, a day or two before the ship sailed, had strolled over to the south side of the Thames, to look at the king's dockyards at Deptford. As I was rambling among the docks, I received a smart slap on the shoulder, and, turning suddenly round, whom should I see but old Tom Johnson, an honest fellow as ever broke bread or wore a tarpaulin ! He was born in our village ; had followed the sea for nearly forty years ; and, once in the course of three or 16 SEED TIME AND HARVEST. 246 four, he contrived to find his way to the old spot, and spend a few days in the valley where he was born. " Why, Bob," said he, " Pm heartily glad to see you, my lad ; so you've taken leg bail of the old folks, and turned rover, in good earnest, ey ? " I told him, I hoped he didn't think I'd left my old mother to shirk for herself, in her old age. " Not a jot," replied the old sailor ; " Squire Seely has told me the whole story, and says he has put the sweat of your brow, more than once or twice either, into the old lady's hand, and made her old weather-beaten heart leap for joy, to hear you was so thought ful a lad. I saw your mother about a year ago, and your sister Rachel." I shook old Tom Johnson, by the hand ; I could not re strain my feelings, for this was the first news I had received from home, for more than five years. " Come, Bob," said the old fellow, " don't be for opening your scuppers and making crooked faces ; though it blows hard enough now, it may get to be calm weather after all." " How is my father doing now ? " 247 SEED TIME AND HARVEST. 17 I inquired. "Why, as to that," answered Tom Johnson, "it's about a twelvemonth since I was there. I told the old lady I might cross your hawse in some part of the world. She has a rough time of it, my boy. The old man holds on to mischief, like a heavy kedge in a clay bottom. The cold- water folks began, about a year ago, to scat ter their seed in the village, in the shape of tracts, and tales, and newspapers. Some of them were thrown at your father's door, and at the door of old Deacon Flint, the distiller. There, as you may suppose, the seed fell in stony places. Your father was in a great rage, and swore he'd shoot the first person, that left another of their rascally publications before his door. I'm afraid it will be a long while, my lad, before the temperance folks get the weather gage of the rum-sellers, and rum-drinkers in our village. They have had a miserable seed time, and the Devil and Deacon Flint, I am afraid, will have the best of the harvest." As Tom, Johnson was to sail, in about a 18 SEED TIME AND HARVEST. 248 week, for the United States, I sent by him a few lines of comfort and a small remittance for my mother. As I have already stated, they never reached the place of their desti nation. The Oranoke, of which this poor fellow was first mate, foundered at sea, and the whole crew perished. After our arrival at Oporto, the crew of the Swiftsure were discharged ; and, finding a favorable chance, I shipped for Philadelphia, where we arrived, after an extremely short and prosperous passage. I directed my course, once more, towards my native hamlet. My feelings were of the most painful and perplexing character. In accumulated years, and even in the little property, which I had gathered, I felt conscious of something like a power and influence; which, by God's grace, I hoped to exert for the protection of my mother. Yet, when I recollected the ungov ernable violence of my father's temper, under the stimulus of liquor, I almost despaired of success. At any rate, I could behold the 249 SEED TIME AND HARVEST. 19 face of her, who bore me, and receive her blessing once more before she died. Having sent my luggage forward, I per formed a considerable part of my journey on foot. I had arrived in the village, adjoining our own. I paused, for an instant, to look at the barn, in which, five years before, I had passed a most miserable night. It brought before me, with a painful precision, the mel ancholy record of the past. Every mile of my lessening way abated something of that confidence, which I had occasionally cher ished, of being the instrument, under God, of bringing happiness again into the dwelling of my wretched parents. I had arrived within two miles of the little river, which forms one of the boundary lines of our village. I was passing a little groce ry, or tipplery, and, standing at the door, I recognized the very individual, who formerly kept the grog-shop in our town, and from whom my father had purchased his rum, for many years. Although it was already gray twilight, I knew him immediately ; and, how- 20 SEED TIME AND HARVEST. 250 ever painful to approach a person, in whom I could not fail to behold the destroyer of my father, I could not repress my earnest desire to learn something of my family. 1 accosted him, and he remembered me at once. His manners were those of a surly and dissatisfied man. In reply to my inqui ries, he informed rne, that my parents and my sister were alive, and added, with a sneer, that my father had set up for a cold-water man ; " but," continued he, with a forced and spiteful laugh, "it will take him all his days, I guess, to put off the old man : they that have gotten the relish of rny rum, are not so very apt to change it for cold water." Upon further inquiry, I ascertained, that there had been a temperance movement in our village ; and that the seed, as poor Tom Johnson said, had been scattered there, with an unsparing hand. I also gathered the information from this rum-seller, that the selectmen had refused to approbate any applicant for a license to sell ardent spirit in our village ; and that he, himself, had therefore been obliged to quit 251 SEED TIME AND HARVEST. 21 his old stand, and take the new one, which he now occupied. I turned from the dram-seller's door and proceeded on my way. It was quite dark ; but the road was familiar to my feet. It afforded me unspeakable pleasure to learn, that my mother and sister were alive and well. But I was exceedingly perplexed, by the rum-seller's statement in relation to my father. Can it be possible, thought I, that he has become a cold-water man ? How true is the rum-seller's remark, that few, who have gotten a taste of his rum, are apt to change it for cold water! For more than twelve years, my father had been an intemperate man ; and, even if he had abandoned ardent spirit, for a time, how little reliance could be placed upon a drunkard's reformation ! Be sides Tom Johnson had expressly stated, that my father had been exceedingly hostile to the temperance movement, from the beginning. With these and similar reflections, my mind continued to be occupied, until I enter ed our village. It was about half past nine, 22 SEED TIME AND HARVEST. 252 when I came within a few rods of the old cottage. A light was still gleaming forth from the window. 1 drew slowly and silent ly near to the door. I thought I heard a voice. I listened attentively. It was my father's. My mother appeared not to reply : sucn was her constant habit, whenever, under the influence of liquor, he gave a loose rein to his tongue, and indulged in unkind and abusive language. I drew still nearer and, passing softly into the entry, I listened more attentively, at the inner door. Can it be possible ! thought I. He was engaged in prayer ! in fervent and pious prayer ! He prayed, with a trembling voice, for the res toration of an absent son! There was a pause. From the movement within, it was evident they had risen from their knees. I gently raised the latch, and opened the door. The father, the mother, the brother, the sister, were locked in the arms of one anoth er ! My regenerated old father fell once more upon his knees ; we all followed his exam ple ; and before a word of congratulation had 253 SEED TIME AND HARVEST. 23 passed from one to the other, he poured forth such a touching strain of thanksgiving and praise to the Giver of every good and perfect gift, for my safe return, as would have melted the heart of the most obdurate offender. It came directly from the heart of a truly peni tent sinner, and it went straightway to the God of mercy. I gazed upon my poor old father. It seemed like the moral resurrec tion of one, already dead and buried, in his trespasses and sins. I glanced rapidly about me : all was peace, all was order ; where all had been strife and confusion before. The rum-jug no longer occupied its accustomed place upon the table : the expanded volume of eternal life was there in its stead ! I gazed with inexpressible joy, upon the happy faces about me ; my father, to all outward appearance, such as he had been in better days, sitting in silence, and evidently restraining the emotions of his soul ; poor Rachel upon my knee, her features bathed with happy tears ; and my dear, old mother turning her countenance, full of gratitude and 24 SEED TIME AND HARVEST. 254 love, alternately towards Heaven and upon a long gono child, returned at last. Six years have now gone by, since a mer- ciful God softened the stubborn soil in my father's heart. The seed did not fall alto gether, as Tom Johnson supposed, upon stony places. Some of them have sprung up, as in our own highly-favored heritage, and borne fruit a hundred fold. Let us thank God, then, who hath enabled us abun dantly to gather the HARVEST ; for peace is once more at our fireside ; the wife has re gained her husband, and the orphans have found their father.