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VOL. I.] 'THE WASHINGTONIAN. PUBLISHED BY JAMES McCAFFERTY, TWICE EVERY MONTH. Office on Macintosh, street—opposite the Post Office. TERMS. For a single copy, for one year, One Dollar; for six copies, to one address, Five Dollars ; for ten copies, to one address, bight Dollars—and so in proportion. {K7- Payment in ail cases to he made in advance. {£?• All communications by mail, must be post paid, to receive attention. WASHINGTON Total Abstinence Society of Augusta. OFFICERS: Dr. Joseph A. Eve, President. Rev. Wm. T. Bkantly, Vice-President. Wm. Hmnes, Jr.,Secretary and Treasurer. Manager)—James Harper, Dr. F. M. Robertson, E. W' Tolman, Jesse Walton, James W. Whitlock, William Shear, C. C. Taliaferro. [From the Tee-Totalcr.] WILLIAM CARL.ETON, OR, THE REFORMED DRUNKARD. BY P. W. LEL.4NP. In the Spring of 18*20, there came tothe village of M., in the state of Massachusetts, a man whom 1 shall designate as William Carleton. lie was just at his majority, and had fixed on M. as an eligible place for prosecuting the business of his calling —that of a nouse carpenter. He was a noble looking man, and something above the mcJi_m height, stout built, and (tosscs*- ing a countenance such as a sculptor would not disdain to look upon. His education was much above the common standard ; and his manners those of a well-bred man. In his intercourse with others, there was an open, hearty frankness, which made him no less accessible than accepta ble to all with whom he came in contact. Carle ton was, besides, an excellent mechanic; tho roughly versed in all the mysteries of his calling, and endowed with a power of despatch never lieforc witnessed among the |>eople of his adopted village. If he laid by less of nis earnings than , others in a similar walk of life; if the fruits of his labors were not always cared for, it was be cause he was more generous, or less penurious than others—it was because he sought money rather as a means than as an end. Still, Carleton was a thriving man, and the resources of future usefulness and support gradually accumulated on his hands. Three years later than the date here given, I attended Carleton’s wedding. He had engaged the affections of Caroline §., the daughter, and only child of a respectable widowed lady of M. A finer looking, happier pair, I never saw before the hymeneal altar. The bride scarcely nine teen, tastefully, yet not gaudily dressed, modest, yet not bashful, entered with a light, yet impos ing step, gracefully hanging upon the arm of the stately young carpenter. There was health in her finely dcvelojied form, and there was glad ness in her rich blue eyes. The happiness of the present, the pleasing anticipations of the future, beamed brightly in her countenance, and reveal ed the workings of a heart full of hope and devo tion. Carleton was not less an object of admiration. His open, manly brow, loaded with rich curls of dark hair; his full mellow eyes and elegantly turned mouth, stamped him at once as a faultless specimen of humanity, created in the image of his Maker. Two years later, and I wa* a guest at the house of Carleton. Caroline had become a mother— the mother of a beautiful boy. She was the pic ture of contentment. Her maiden smile still sat An her lips—her bright blue eyes had grown yet brighter still, and her step was light and buoyant as on the day of her wedding. Carleton was all life, health and activity. Happy in the bosom of his little family, respected by all; and full of hope, he gave a new impulse to all around him. His -clear head made him a safe counsellor, and his veady wit a brilliant companion. In a word, he had become the master spirit of M. Five years rolled away, and I had not seen ■Carleton. In 1830, accident once more threw me into the village of M. I there met Carleton, and a warm and hearty meeting it was; yet he was not precisely the man I had parted with five years before. He was, I thought, less self-pos sessed, less energetic, and less guarded in his conversation. His bumor seemed coawer, and in his manner there was a sort of dashing light ness, not exactly in keeping with his former character. His eyes, too, I thought, had lost something of their wonted brilliancy, and the color in his face appeared deeper than at our last interview. Yet so many years had elapsed since our meeting, changes were to be expected, and besides, there was so much of the frank William ' Carleton still left, and liiv observations at the i moment, resulted in no unwelcome suspicions. I n the course of our short interview, old recollec tions were revived, old scenes rehearsed, and new subjects introduced. Carleton was so bril liant, so happy, and so much like bis former self, that at the end ot an hour I had quite forgotten the embryo impressions excited at the moment of greeting. In the evening I was at his house. If my at tention had been arrested, on meeting Carleton, by some undefinable alteration in bis apjiearancc, it was doubly so when Caroline nr Mrs. Carleton made her appearance in the sitting room. She was cheertul, Imt her cheerfulness seemed rather forced than spontaneous. Her brow was slightly clouded, and her beautiful blue eyes appeared more fixed and cast down than formerly. She affected to he gay, hut evidently it required an effort to he so. There was too, an appearance of marked submission, mingled with tear in her manner, altogether unlike her wonted, hearty ebullitions of feeling. 1 thought I could perceive, also, that when her eyes met those of Carleton there was an apjiearance of something like shrinking, or restraint, as though there were certain bounds beyond which she dare not pass. AH certainly was not right. I noticed again the unnatural flush oil Carleton’s face. It was now more apparent than at our meeting in the morn ing. A sudden conviction of the truth Hashed across mv mind. 1 did not embody the idea; 1 gave it not language, but there it was enthroned like a demon; and as ineffaceable as the impress of eternal truth —Carleton was a drunkard! Os the terrible truth, I obtained evidence enough on the following morning; I need not repeat it here. I left the village, and saw no more of him for several years; and when subse quently I did, he was a perfect wreck, both in [icrsoii and in fortune. Indeed, i never saw a more disgusting lump of humanity. Bloated, filthy and brutish, he had been at different times an inmate of the work-house, the jail and house of correction, from all which he came forth seven fold more a monster of depravity than when he entered either. Poor Caroline! she had drained the cup of wretchedness to the verv dregs! She had been driven from her pleasant home— her furniture and wardrobe, piece after piece had passed out of her possession, till at last she and her little boy were tenants of a miserable hovel in a remote corner of her native town. To their abode Carleton would at times find his way; and there, instead of meeting frowns and reproaches, instead of being repulsed and driven from her door, as an outcast and a scourge, she, who in the budding hour of womanhood had sworn fidelity and love before the altar of God, extend ed to the lost inebriate the hand of affection and kindness. There , he who had sunk in the scale of humanity, even lower than the most degraded of his species, was warmed and nourished by the very being whose hopes and aspirations he had forever crushed. Woman! thou art indeed an enigma! All weakness, when danger appears in the distance, but indomitable in the hour of trial! From the lips of Mrs. Carleton herself, 1 learnt the sickening story of her long years of suffering and wretchedness, yet in the recital, not one un kind expression, not a single term of reproach, escaped her lips while speaking of her husband. For his conduct she offered no excuse—nothing in palliation of his dreadful course of life, and whatever might have been her hopes, she gave utterance to no expectation that he would ever again return to the sober walks of life. The rich overflowing of her buoyant heart seemed forever dried up, or crushed beneath a load of misery, for whose alleviation, time, the last prop of the wretched, had brought none of its healing balm. With this interview closed my acquaintance with this once interesting family. Years rolled away, and I had ceased entirely to think of their condition, except at long intervals, when some kindred incident called to mind the ruin of those in whose welfare I accidentally acquired no in considerable interest. In a word, they became to me as though they had never been. In the course of last summer, I had occasion to visit the interior of Massachusetts. Arriving, near night fall, at a small town in the county of repose, I drew up at a somewhat uninviting pub lic house, the only one in the village, where I ordered supper and demanded accommodations for the night. I noticed a considerable concourse of the people about the house and in the public room, and from the conversation going on, learnt there was to be a temperance lecture that evening at the town house, standing a few rods distant from the hotel at which I stopped. I inquired of my host who was to. address the meeting, whe ther a townsman of his or a stranger 1 A Stranger, I reckon, was the reply We have none of that sort o’ animal in this town; OR AUGUSTA, GA. JUNE 20, 1842. folks here mind their own business. Do you know the name ofthc lecturer 1 was my nextinquiry. 1 hav nt asked, was the laconic answer; and the publican turned into his bar to serve a etts/o mcr to a glass of brandy. By this time the room was nearly full. Some were drinking, and others ridiculing the great temperance movement, of which they had heard much and seen something. I soon perceived, however, that the cause had made little or no pthgrcss here, and 1 was well satisfied on another |Miint, that those present, at least were determin ed it should not; yet I was pleased to notice when the hour arrived, that nearly all made tljcir way to the town-house; some perhaps to create disturbance, and others to while away an i(|e hour, before their last glass for the night. With the crowd, I passed over and took my slat in a remote corner of the building. The house was soon filled to overflowing. The body of it was taken |iossession of by a large concourse of ladies, while the outer seats and galleries were otcopied mostly by men and boys. Near the "pin entrance, in the broad aisle, within the bidding, stood some twenty or thirty rough look iijg men, with long beards, poorly clothed, nnd njani testing that sort of breeding usually picked up in grog-shops and low drinking-houses. The \ltlgar merriment, and their overstrained attempts i wit, were insufferably disgusting. But what ieved me most, was to see the Female part of e audience often join in the half-suppressed ugh which their miserable levity would at times ovoke, instead of discountenancing their ill ned and shameful violations of propriety. But is scene was of short duration; for in the very !iidst ofthe joking and jeering, the lecturer made is appearance, in company with a respcatable >oking gentleman, who I afterwards understood ras a citizen of the town. i“ Make way for the steam engine!” cried one f the persons standing in the aisle, as the lcctur r was passing through thecrowd. i “ Now for a cataract of cold water 1” exclaimed & companion at his elbow. “Landlord,” shouted a third, “give us a nipper of gin cock-tail, with a tommahawk in it!” This last attempt at wit produced a general laigh, which died away in a low titter along the side galleries. la the mean time the lecturer mounted the lit tle cesk at the farther end ofthc hall. Me was a large, elegantly formed, middle aged man, with dark hair and dark eye-brows, beneath which rolled a full mellow pair of eyes, as clear as a liv ing, undisturbed fountain of water. He surveyed the audience for a moment, then stepping it|>on the raised platform, brought himself to a speaking attitude within the niche ofthe desk before him. His commanding figure arrested every eye; all tumult ceased, and each member, as if spell bound, suddenly became as silent and motionless as would have been so many marble statues. “ I am here,” commenced the speaker, in a clear, strong, yet musical tone of voice, slightly ir.clining his body over the desk, “ I am here to relate the history of a drunkard; of a drunkard who, during long years of unmitigated inebria tion, passed through all grades of numan exist ence, from ease and alfluence, down to the lowest depths of poverty and wretchedness. In a word, your speaker is here to relate the history of his own degradation.” With this simple exordium, followed by a few other observations, the lecturer entered upon the recital of the incipient steps of his career of ulti mate inebriation, detailing in all the simplicity of truth, the effect produced on himself, on his standing, and finally on his wife and family. Before tnc expiration of the first halfhour, every thing but the speaker and his subject had been forgotten, and as he went on, his own sober ear nestness began to show itself on the feelings of the audience. While recounting his first devia tions from the path of sobriety—the stated drams, and the gradual formation of that habit, which, in the end, overwhelmed him and all concerned wita him in one common vortex of ruin—those poor fellows standing in the aisle, to whom I have be fire referred, one after another began to near the speaker, till, without concert, or knowing why, they formed one compact group directly in froit, and almost in reach of the lecturer. Such a stene I had never before witnessed, and I trem bled, I confess, lest he who had raised the storm should be unable to control it and direct it to the end for which it had been excited. I was mista ke!. Every new effort was crowned with new suaess. At length he spoke of the wrongs which in tenperance had heaped on the heads and hearts of women. He related with thrilling minuteness th« miseries which his own wife had endured— painted in language as dark and gloomy as the subject itself—the damp, lonely hovel in which foi years he had resided in the midst of poverty and wretchedness, and then, as if suddenly ue- polled I)}' an irresistible flood of inspiration, gave utterance to one of the most thrilling and lofty panegyrics on woman 1 ever heard. As he enu merated their virtues—their patient endurance of wrong —their angelic meekness in the hour of affliction—their boldness in I lie midst of danger— their constancy, and more than all, their npver dying hope; his flight was fearfully grand, like mountain piled on mountain, while every hearer sat in breathless silence to catch the towering climax of bis brilliant display of eloquence and panegyric. For my own part, 1 was wholly un prepared for this effort on the part ofthe sjrcakcr. I trembled at the giddy height to which lie had mounted, and sat with my hands grasping the railing, expecting every moment to see him buried under the weight of his own gorgeous enconium; but at this moment ofintensc anxiety,the speaker suddenly paused on the very summit of his effort, and casting up his eyes, exclaimed, in a tone even painful from its clearness and energy— “ Merciful God! what an inexhaustible fountain of kindness and benevolence hast thou created in the heart of woman!” The effect was electrical. A slight stir through out the house indicated the relief of the audience, and I doubt whether, in a moment after, there was a tearless eye in that heterogeneous assem bly. For my own part, I wept like a child. So brilliant was the picture he had drawn, so giddy the height to which he had carried himself, and so .easy, and yet so majestic his descent, that at the instant of relief 1 started to my feet, and in a moment after found myself standing in a sido aisle, within a few feet of this orator. The first sentence uttered after this change of position arrested my attention. The sound of the speaker’s voice seemed familiar, I cast a scrutinizing glance at his countenance—and another, and another—my heart was in my throat —the lecturer was William Carleton! At the moment of recognition I forgot myself— forgot every thing. Here was the very man whom years before 1 had seen in the lowest depths of degradation, a burthen upon society, a dis grace to his species, anil an object of pity to all who had known him in his better days. Here he stood before me, redeemed, an apostle of tem perance, drawing tears from all eyes, and capti vating all hearts. On recovering once more the current of the discourse, I found'the speaker making an appeal to the intemperate to come forward and put their names to the reformed drunkard’s constitution, a copy of which lay upon the table before him. He gave a plain unvarnished account ofthe rise and progress of this new movement; spoke ofthe hundreds of thousands to which the long cata logue of the ransomed had swollen along the shores ofthe Atlantic, and wound up by urging, once and again, all, however low or debased, to / begin that night the glorious work ofreform. And now commenced a scene of thrilling in terest. From every part of the house, men, and even women, eagerly pressed towards the table. The old inebriates already pointed out whose bodies had been for years steeping in liquid Arc, and young men just on the threshold of destruc tion, one after another, placed their names on that strange document. It was a grand sight to behold women leading up their husbands, fathers their sons, and sisters their brothers. All fear of ridicule was forgotten; conviction had overcome every other consideration; the head and the heart were for the first time, perhaps for many years, found in harmony, and men did the bidding of their consciences as in the days of Paul and Tiis associates. Even the landlord shed tears. I need not describe my interview with Carleton that night. We both stayed at the same house, occupied the same room, and except a slight tinge ot melancholy, I found him the same noble spirit ed fellow he was at our meeting twenty years before. On the following morning we parted, he to labor elsewhere in the great cause to which he was devoting every thought, and I to pursue a tiresome journey over the almost interminable hills of Berkshire. On my return, I could not resist the temptation to take M. in my way, though some twenty miles out of my direct route. I found Mrs. Carleton as described to me by her husband on the night of our unexpected meeting at . She was all life and animation. Her soft blue eyes had regained their wonted lustre, and the rich glow of her cheeks, a little mellowed by time anil sor row, indicated that all was now right, both with in and without. They had returned to the iden tical house formerly occupied by them; and their once beautiful little boy, just now on the verge of manhood, was busy at work in his father’s shop. Their happiness was complete. And now, gen tle reader, we will take leave of William Carle ton, the reformed drunkard , adding only, that the true original of the foregoing tale, is now in one of the Middle States, laboring with un bounded success in the great cause to which Providence has so signally called him. [Mo. 2.