From Wealth to Poverty

Excerpt

CHAPTER I.

A DEPARTURE.

"Richard, you will keep from drink, will you not, dear?" and the speaker, in order to make her pleading irresistible, kissed the one to whom these words were addressed again and again; and, as with a hand upon each shoulder, she looked lovingly into his eyes, there was an added pathos which, to a man of Richard Ashton's sympathetic and sensitive nature, was all powerful.

"Well, Ruth, dear, God helping me, I will again be a man, and when I am tempted I will think of my dear little wife and my darling children at home; and remembering how they love me, though I have been such an indifferent husband and father to them, I will not touch nor taste the cursed stuff."

The tears gleamed in his eyes as he thus spoke, but feeling his manhood was being compromised he endeavored to suppress them, the effort, however, was in vain, for the deepest depths of a noble, sensitive nature had been wrought upon by the loving appeal of his wife and the pent-up feeling, gathering force by the very effort which he had made to suppress it, manifested itself in a series of short, choking sobs. He returned the kisses of his wife, clasped her convulsively to him, and, as he looked down into the upturned face, his eyes manifested an affection which found no expression in speech. He stooped down and fondly kissed his children and then opening the door, with satchel in hand, he darted out, only looking back when his wife called to him, as she stood with her three little ones on the threshold—

"Remember, Richard, your wife and children will pray for you, that our Father in heaven may preserve you from danger, give you strength to resist temptation, and bring you back in safety to those who love you better than their own lives."

He stood looking back for a moment, and as he saw his wife and children still gazing intently after him, he murmured, "God bless you, my darlings;" and turning again, walked rapidly on until he was lost to view.

RICHARD AND RUTH ASHTON.

Richard Ashton was a native of the town of G——, in the county of B——, England. His father, who was a draper in good circumstances, had given his son a liberal education and had brought him up to his own calling. The son, a young man of quick parts, took advantage of the opportunities so generously offered to him and prosecuted his studies with commendable success, and by the time he was a stripling of sixteen was possessed of knowledge that few of his years could boast.

Richard was also an omniverous reader, and, as his father possessed a good library, he, from a very early period had literally devoured the contents of the books which lined its shelves, and thus became well versed in history, both ancient and modern, in the biographies of most of the celebrated men of all ages, and was also well acquainted with the most eminent poets, from Chaucer to Tennyson, ever having an apt quotation at his command to fasten home a maxim or make more pungent a witticism. In fact he had further developed a mind naturally broad by making his own the best thoughts of the ages, and his sensitive nature could not, knowingly, have given pain to a worm—no one that was worthy appealed in vain to his generosity, and it seemed to be the endeavor of his life to gain happiness by making those with whom he associated happy....