Meanwhile John, young as he was, had acquired a strong appetite for strong drink, but still had not up to this date been entirely drunk, though he had quite a number of times departed from the strict line of temperance.

About this time there was to be a "muster" at Reading, and one of the companies in the town where he lived being minus a drum, our hero, being a handy lad, was sent to Malden, a neighboring town, to get one. Here he fell in with some kindred spirits, with whom he fell to drinking "bumpers " in token of good fellowship. At first they took a little "cordial," but soon aspired above this unambitious beverage, and ascended through the scale of lesser drinks up to sublime New England itself, which, of course, soon upset them. For the first time, in his young life, our hero was, in the Tam O'Shanter fashion,

"O'er all the ills of life victorious."

He got completely drunk, so that he was unable to carry the drum, or even himself, home that night; and he found it necessary to put up at some intermediate barn, as many others have done in a like predicament.

We have been particular to record this first

cardinal feat of our hero in the service of Gen. Alchohol, that Prince of slaughter. We would now apprise the reader, however, that we shall not hereafter be particular in specifying all such feats, for we fear they alone would swell this book to the contemplated size.

CHAPTER II.

THE time had again arrived for our hero to make another sally forth into the world. His genius was of so discursive an order that he could not remain at home, which we may suppose was too limited a field for its advantageous display. So he once more absconded from that short-sighted authority which seems not to have appreciated his talents. And whether from disgust of the world, or from a conscientious resolve to renounce the world, the flesh, and the devil, it now came into his head to join the Shakers. Accordingly he wended his way to Harvard and offered himself for admission into that chaste band of self-denying believers, who sojourn in

that town. He met with a kind reception had his hair trimmed after their approved style, which gave him a very saint-like appearance, and was also clad after their peculiar fashion. From some cause or other, however, our hero did not remain long with the Shakers. Their mode of life was probably too monotonous and inactive. From the Shakers he returned to his father's house, and was not a little laughed at for his Shaker metamorphosis.

Being temporarily satisfied with vagabondizing John was contented to settle down" for a spell to steady labor. He unfortunately took up his abode with a man who indulged himself very freely in the use of ardent spirits; and, what was worse, extended the same liberty to our hero, who we may suppose was not at all backward to avail himself of it. It was John's duty to rise very early in the morning, "build a fire," and put on the tea-kettle, preparatory to the morning dram.

His master would then turn out, and they would attend to their morning devotions, which consisted, we are sorry to say, not in spiritual offerings to their Creator, but in sundry spiritual offerings to Bacchus, of whom they, our hero especially, were very devout worshippers.

John remained with this man until his eighteenth year, his habit of intoxication meanwhile strengthening. He now left him and loafed about the country for a time and then went to work in Cambridge, where he remained six months keeping tolerably sober the while. Six months was as long a time, however, as our hero cared about working at Cambridge or any where else; and he got his pay, part of which he dutifully paid over to his father, took the residue went to Boston with the intent of purchasing a suit of clothes. Here he fell in with a gang of drunken sailors who took him to their haunts of vice and intemperance, where he soon expended his cash-thus verifying the saying that "the fool and his money are soon parted." Being now desitute of funds, and poorly clad, he was ashamed to go home, as it was there known that he went to Boston to get some clothes. He therefore went with his new made friends to their boarding house, the keeper of which agreed to board him till he could get a chance to ship for a sea voyage. He had not been here long before his friends ascertained his "whereabouts" and prevailed upon him to return home, which he reluctantly did.

John was not doomed to remain long at home. A neighbor who about this time was preparing to go to the then Province of Maine to take up a portion of wild land, proposed to our hero to accompany him; to which proposal, "with the consent and advise" of his father, he readily acceded.

er

They soon embarked for Maine in one of the Bangor packets. Here John was in, or rather on, his element. He "breathed freer and deep·" than he had for a long time before. Nothing occurred to them worthy of note until they arrived at the mouth of the Penobscot. Here they became becalmed, and could not budge an inch; and what greatly aggravated the discomfort of our hero, and other devotees of Bacchus on board, was that their store of grog was exhausted. With their rum, all good cheer had departed from their midst. The rum coterie then held a secret consultation, whereupon it was decreed that our hero, and one other, should go ashore, ostensibly to get some eggs (that the Captain might be deceived) but in reality to get something to cheer up their flagging spirits. They got two of the seamen to row them ashore, and off they started in pursuit of some rum.