At length they began to get angry and call each other names, till they got a-going and couldn't stop. They will separate with black eyes and bloody noses!

See that young man stealing from his master's drawer. He came from the country a promising boy. But the rest of the clerks went to the theatre, and he thought he must go too. He began, thinking he would only go once. But he had got a-going and couldn't stop. He had used up his wages, and wants more money. He cannot resist the temptation, when he knows there is money in the drawer. He has got a-going-he will stop in the prison!

Fifty young men were, some years ago, in the habit of meeting together, in a room at a public-house, to "enjoy themselves," One of them, as he was going there one evening, began to think there might be danger in the way. He stopped and considered a moment, and then said to himself, (6 Right about face!" He turned on his heel and went back to his room, and was never seen at the public house again! He has become rich. Six of the young men followed his example. The remaining fortythree got a-going, and couldn't stop, till they landed most of them in the drunkard's grave.-Beware, then, boys, how you get a-going. Be sure before you start that you are in the right way, for when you are sliding down hill it is hard to stop!

PRACTICAL PAPERS, No. 6.

By Mr. G. M. MURPHY.

THE FORCE OF FABLE.

We need a serpent's wisdom, a dove's gentleness, an apostle's fervour, and a martyr's faith successfully to advocate the temperance cause. Especially is this the case among the young. Small pitchers have big ears, and little folks are great critics; they soon discover if an address is worthy their attention, and if not, no amount of "hush! hush!" no shouts of silence, tinkling of bells, or ominous shakes of the head, will tempt them to pay it.

To point a moral, adorn a tale, or give pungency to an address, few methods, if any, are superior to the use of parable and fable, and yet, we are almost ashamed to confess it, we hardly remember an instance of hearing an advocate making use of them on the platform. As far as temperance talk is at present concerned, Æsop need never have lived, or La Fontaine, Cowper, and Gay have uttered their wisdom in verse. This ought not so to be. Sacred, as well as profane history and experience, combine to assure us of the power of such teaching. How Jotham's fable of the fig tree, the olive, the vine, and the bramble (Judges ix. 7-15.) convicted the Schechemites of ingratitude. David

stood self condemned before the Prophet of God, who had just detailed in his hearing the parable of the poor man's ewe lamb (2 Sam. xii. 1-7). Our Saviour's instructions were continually interwoven with similar apologues, nearly fifty being recorded by the Evangelists as spoken by Him, who spake as never man spake, and who, as if to prove the power of this illustrative teaching, adapted it so largely to his own.

Ancient history records many examples of princes and peoples, made wiser by the utterance of these embodiments of wisdom, and experience acquaints us with the fact, that no portion of "Guy's" or "Mavor's" spelling books receives so much willing attention from boys and girls as the "Fox and the Grapes," the "Dog in the Manger," and their fabulous friends.

Why should not the Band of Hope speakers, then, make use of Æsop? The wisdom of 2,400 years ago, is wisdom also today. The Dog and the Shadow, aptly illustrates the many who seek pleasure in drink, and pay solid coin for unsubstantial satisfaction. While the blandishments of the publican are strikingly represented, by the Fox who wheedled the Crow out of its supper of cheese, by the desire to hear its beautiful voice. The Mouse releasing the Lion, by gnawing through the meshes of the net which had snared him, is a powerful lesson on the mighty influence of little folk. Could the insatiable character of the drunkard's appetite be more forcibly expressed than in the following translation from the French fabulist ?--

-66

Each has his faults to which he clings,

In spite of shame or fear,

This apothegm a story brings,

To make its truth more clear.

A sot had lost health, mind, and purse,

And truly for that matter,

Sots mostly lose the latter,

Ere running half their course.

When wine one day, of wit had filled the room,

His wife enclosed him in a spacious tomb.

There did the fumes evaporate

At leisure from his drowsy pate.

When he awoke, he found

His body wrapped around

With grave clothes chill and damp,
Beneath a dim sepulchral lamp.—
"How's this? my wife a widow sad,"
He cried, "and I a ghost, dead! dead!"
Thereat his spouse, with snaky hair,
And robes like those the furies wear,
With voice to fit the realms below,

Brought boiling caudle to his bier,
For Lucifer the proper cheer,

By which her husband came to know
(For he had heard of those three ladies,)
Himself a citizen of Hades.

"What may your office be?"
The phantom questioned he.
"I'm server up of Pluto's meat,

And bring his guests the same to eat."

"Well," says the sot, not taking time think,
"And don't you bring us anything to drink?"

Among the lost, the drunkard thirsts and craves for that which has ruined body and soul.

How the story of the Cat and the old Rat warns us to keep clear of danger, though it may assume the garb of safety. Puss had been so successful in her rat hunts, that the enemies to the pantry were either all dead, or so terrified that they kept within their holes; this not only whetted pussy's appetite, but her wits, so that one day when the lovers of cheese peeped forth from their holes, they rejoiced to behold their enemy hung head downwards by the wall, and after blessing the doer of so worthy a deed, they trooped forth to supply their neccssities, when lo! while they were paying their attention to the cheeses, cakes, cream, and whatever beside took their fancies, their foe quietly dropped from the beam by which she had suspended herself by her hinder legs, and pouncing upon her victims, two or three of the fattest and hindermost rewarded her stratagem. This made the rats very shy, and puss again suffered from hunger, which she hoped to abate by another ruse. She covered herself with meal in an open barrel, and ceasing to purr, and almost to breathe, waited for a signal of success; but while she lay in the tub, an old tailless rat, who had been in the wars, after a careful survey of the suspicious bait, thus soliloquised in Miss Mild-and-sly's hearing:

"Ah! ah! friend cat,

Í much suspect a heap like that,

Your meal is not the thing, perhaps,

For one, who something knows of traps.

Should you a sack of meal become,

I'd let you be, and stay at home."

There was wisdom in avoiding even the appearance of evil. Never depend upon others for doing what you should do yourself. How strikingly is this sentiment brought out in the fable of "The Farmer, the Lark, and her young ones." As long as the farmer depended on relations, friends, and neigh

bours to get his field reaped, the lark's nest was secure from disturbance, but no sooner does the farmer set in his own sickle, than the old bird and her young must find another home.

That it is better to be useful than beautiful, is taught us by "The Stag and its Antlers," for while the despised legs saved, the admired horns, entangled it to its ruin. Would we learn the value of perseverance, and the folly of presumptuous haste, turn to the fable of "The Hare and Tortoise." Is it true that

prayer without effort is folly, and that effort without prayer is presumption? See an apt illustration, in the story of the Waggoner who besought Jupiter's help in his trouble. But we might fill the "Record" with examples of the various illustrations contained in fabulous lore, and yet far from exhaust the subject. Our object will be gained if Band of Hope advocates will turn their attention to this wide field of wisdom, for the elucidation and enforcement of their subject; it will well repay their efforts, and frequently enable them to fasten their lessons of sobriety, truth, and virtue like a nail in a sure place, fastened by the Master of assemblies.

HOW FRANK CROKER WAS REFORMED. ›

Frank Croker had a tidy wife, and a set of bright, intelligent children, but he had no great liking for their society; and as to spending every evening with them, he would as soon have shut himself in the village church, and listened to the hooting of its owls. Yet Frank was not what is called a bad fellow at heart. It is true he liked drinking and smoking at "The Bengal Tiger," but, as his neighbours said, that fault was common. It was the general opinion that he would not willingly have harmed a fly; and probably the people who held this view were in the right. It is so easy to strain at a gnat and swallow a camel! Frank Croker had married well. soul, and although she received but made both ends meet to perfection. held, that constant striving to feed and clothe her children, and pay her way, without letting the world into the secret of her straitened means, had paled the cheek and undermined the health of the once blooming Hester. Certain it is that she had so strangely altered since her marriage, that her own cousin, Margaret Gower, when she came with her husband and children to settle at Hopedale, could scarcely recognise her. Yet Croker loved-or fancied he loved-his wife, and often told his fellowworkmen that he was "lucky" in having won her. The land

His partner was a thrifty half her husband's wages, But there were those who

lord of "The Bengal Tiger" was often compelled to listen to a list of Hester's virtues, as, in the long summer evenings, he sat with his best customer on the bench before his door. Perhaps Frank had a notion that to praise his wife would make some amends for starving her.

Yes, starving; for it was simply impossible for Hester to provide for her children and feed herself at one and the same time. Even the eggs which were laid by the children's poultry were sent to the market, in order that he-the selfish fathermight have a decent joint for his Sunday's dinner!

"Your boys are fine fellows," remarked Margaret Gower, one evening, as in returning with her husband from a cottage Bible-reading, she paused at the door of the inn to exchange civilities with Croker; "but to my mind, they look very thin and careworn. Is that your fault?"

"Not likely," said Frank; "but they both take after their mother. She's thin enough, ain't she?"

"Yes; she don't get enough to eat," said Margaret bluntly. "You just spend your evenings at home, instead of letting yourself be eat up by Bengal tigers, and you'll soon see a change in your family."

"I can't spend my evenings at home," said Frank. "I'm too sociable."

"Better say, at once, too selfish," cried Mrs. Gower, who, when she once began, "spoke her mind" without fear of consequences. "If you felt any interest in helping your wife and children, you would soon be able to spend your evenings with them without hankering after public-houses and pot-compa-, nions."

Frank laughed, and said it was well they were not within hearing of the landlord. Then turning to Gower, he inquired how he spent his evenings.

"At home," replied Margaret's husband, who had hitherto been acting the part of an amused yet anxious listener; and if you will come to our cottage, you shall have a specimen of my way of enjoying myself."

Frank rose and followed him, not altogether from curiosity.. His conscience had been awakened by Margaret's home-thrust, and he was seriously beginning to suspect that he was a fool. The Gowers had been living in the village for several months, yet this was his first visit to their home. They were not of his stamp, for they were religious people, and hitherto he had carefully avoided them.