your proper subject than before. You have wandered, in point of distance, as far as Persia; and as to time, you have made a jump backward of more than two thousand years. What next?

Jem. Troth, ye're mighty particular! If you don't be azy stoppin me, I won't grind at all, at all, and ye may turn yeʼrself.

Dr. Well, let go the crank, and I'll give you a specimen of my work, off hand.

[The doctor turns, while Jemmy looks on with amazement.]

The fire glowed bright beneath the still,

And fiercely boiled the foaming flood,
Destined the drunkard's veins to fill,

To scorch his brain and fire his blood.
The workmen cheerly plied their tasks,
When in the great distiller came

T' inspect the work; and now he asks,

"How boils the flood? How burns the flame?"

Vexed that the hell-broth cooks so slow,

He mounts the vat, with careless tread,

To stir the mixtures vile below,

But slips, and plunges over head!
Panting and gasping hard for breath,

He struggles with the damning tide,
And would have yielded there to death,
But helping hands were now applied,
Which dragged him from the foaming vat,
Resembling much a drowned wharf-rat.

SELECTIONS FROM CONTRIBUTIONS TO THE

PRESS.

A BRIEF PLAN OF A TEMPERANCE CAMPAIGN.

THE following letter, addressed to Daniel Kimball, late editor of the Massachusetts Temperance Standard, and which appeared in the columns of that paper July 18, 1845, may interest the reader, as it expresses the author's views of the proper method of conducting a temperance campaign. The time and circumstances which called it forth the reader will gather from the letter itself.

FRIEND KIMBALL:

MANCHESTER, July 8, 1845.

You have doubtless, ere this, obtained from the New York papers an account of the State Temperance Convention, held at Albany, on the 25th of June; and so far as concerns the labor actually performed by that body, you have doubtless a more detailed account than I could give at this distance of time, as I took no notes of the proceedings. I wish, nevertheless, to convey to you, and, through the Standard, to others more immediately concerned, some impressions which that occasion made on my mind, in relation to the state of the temperance cause 、 in New York, and its wants at the present crisis.

There will be, during the year, a great deal of discussion, in relation to the law which was passed by the New York legislature at its last session; leaving to the several towns and cities (except New York city) the decision of the question, in April, 1846, whether licenses shall, or shall not, be granted for the sale of intoxicating drinks. And yet I fear our friends will

come to the conflict, at that time, in a measure unprepared, from a mistaken view of what is necessary to that preparation. Something more is wanted than a discussion of the subject in county or state conventions. The war must be carried into t enemy's country. The friends of temperance should organize at once in every town, and not only hold frequent meetings in the different school districts, but flood the town with temperance publications. And on the character of these publications, as well as the character of discussions which will be had, every thing will depend. Let not our friends in the Empire State suffer their attention to be diverted from the main point to abstract and wire-drawn speculations about constitutions and inalienable rights. Keep the great eye of the public, as well as individual eyes, right to the main point. Our neighbors and friends are falling on every side into drunkards' graves. Families are overwhelmed with sorrow, suffering, and shame, in view of the course pursued by the inebriated husband and father. Human bodies are diseased by alcohol, until they present to the world "a bloated mass of rank, unwieldy woe." Reason is dethroned, and thousands of men are turned out from the grog-shops and the whiskey bar rooms raving maniacs, fitted for any outrage upon the property and lives of unoffending citizens, which a mind diseased may suggest. Once pleasant homes are falling to ruins, and thousands of acres of the once fertile soil of New York are so grossly neglected by the drunken owners, that "thorns and thistles cover the face thereof, and the stone wall thereof is broken down." Domestic happiness expires in the fumes of alcohol. The hearts of ten thousand wives and mothers are breaking and bleeding, pierced and trampled upon by the accursed traffic in strong drink. Ragged and shoeless children are roaming in the streets, their physical comfort, their education, and their morals neglected. Those primary schools of vice and immorality, the grog-shop and the bar-room, are open to the thoughtless and unreflecting, seven days in every week through the year, without even a quarterly vacation;

and thousands of our reckless young men are there learning, from rum-parched tongues, the profane oath and the obscene jest, which they in turn will teach to others, thus daily widening the influence and increasing the virulence of the moral contagion. The Sabbath is counted as nought wherever these influences prevail, and men recklessly trample on the authority of God, and desert his holy temples, spending the time set apart for the special worship of the Most High in rioting and drunkenness. All the great interests of society, agricultural, manufacturing, and commercial, are suffering more from the influence of intoxicating drink than from any other cause; while our poorhouses, prisons, and insane hospitals are filled with the wretched victims of the accursed traffic. Let our New York friends direct the attention of their fellow-citizens unceasingly to these terrible truths, confirmation of which may be found in every county and town of the state. Array these facts on paper, and put a copy into the hands of every family, until they shall be made to reflect, to feel — ay, and to speak; until they shall be prompted to exclaim with the poet,―

"Shall tongues be mute when deeds are wrought

Which well might shame extremest hell?

Shall freemen lock the indignant thought?

Shall mercy's bosom cease to swell?
Shall honor bleed? shall truth succumb?

Shall pen, and press, and soul be dumb?"

Let the enemy talk of constitutions and inalienable rights, of free trade, and the like, to the end of the chapter; but let us talk of facts - of soul-stirring FACTS of daily occurrence, and from those facts reason out the duties and obligations of those we address by plain and logical argument, resorting to no quirks or quibbles, disdaining any use of sophistry, and careless about scholastic elegance. Study the subject, by day and by night, in all its relations, and make yourselves familiar with every argument by which the right and the truth may be sustained, and then grapple boldly with the enemies of truth.

Join issue with them wherever they may be met—in the public meeting, in the columns of the public journals, in the social circle, in the stage-coach, in the rail-car, and the steamboat. Be instant in season and out of season. Demand, as you justly may, (where it is not now exerted,) the influence of the pulpit. "Circulate the documents," with untiring industry, and pray God for light, strength and victory. Thus and thus only can the Empire State be prepared to settle aright the question to be submitted to her decision next April.

But I must rein up my quill, which feeling has driven upon the gallop along the track of desolation. I became strongly interested in the state of things now existing in New York, while at the Albany Convention—almost too strongly for the cool and quiet performance of my duties at home. It is glorious to see the old Empire State nerving every giant limb of her huge frame to shake off the anaconda that has twined itself around her. There are noble spirits, within her borders, that are now being marshalled for a desperate conflict, and every bone in my skin, and every fibre of my frame, ache to be with them in the thickest of the fight. The old Bay State, however, demands my services, and must have them.

THE RUM-SELLER'S REMEDY.

“I do not allow loafers about my establishment,” said a taverner to us, some time since, when we were pressing him pretty closely in an argument in reference to the character of his business. This remark was accompanied by an expression of self-complacency which seemed to say, "There, sir, is a triumphant vindication of my business." "But, sir," we inquired, “do you never sell a glass of strong drink to individuals whom you know to be drunkards? "O, yes," was his reply, "but not when they are drunk. I never allow a