University of Virginia Library

2. CHAPTER II.
THE BIRTH-NIGHT PARTY.

Spring had come—Birds sung sweetly in the bushes and
modest flowers were springing to new-life in the narrow beds
around the pretty cottage where dwelt little Peleg, and his mothere—but
within there was sadness, sorrow and death.—There
lay a body, prepared for the narrow bed “appointed for all
the living” from which there is no newlife—the Spirit unprepared;
had been liberated, by violence, from the bonds which
confined it to earth, and was now where it witnessed, in all
dreadful reality, the degrading results of those habits which debase
high resolves and yield holy pleasures, for the gratification
of low passions and grovelling appetites.

The husband and father had been found dead, on the highway
between the village grog-shop and his home,—his death
was a violent one—what man who ever died of the direct influences
of intoxication did not have a violent death!

The funeral was not numerously attended; from the church
yard to their saddened home, but one person accompanied the
chief mourners—that one was Jane Pridore. She was welcomed
to the cottage in a manner which showed that she was a frequent
but never a tedious visiter.

“You have been so kind to us,” said Peleg—“You are a
little girl not bigger than I am, but you can do so much.”

“Father is kind to me, Peleg. He is rich, and I have something
to do with. If you were as rich as I am, you could do a
great deal more than I do.”

“I'll be rich some day,” said Peleg, I know I will, and

then I'll do a great deal. I'll not forget the poor, I know I
won't.”

“Perhaps you can do something for some of my folks some
day,” returned Jane.

“But you're so rich, you'll never be poor, and what I can
do I must do for the poor. I never can forget the time when I
was a poor drunkard's son, if I live to be a hundred years old,
and get as rich as Stephen Girard,” answered Peleg.

“I've read in my books, Peleg,” said Jane, “of many rich
people becoming poor. You nor I don't know what may happen;
but I must run home now. Good bye Peleg, and good
bye Mrs. Brown.”

“Good bye, my little benefactress,” said Mrs. Brown.

Peleg followed Jane to the garden gate, and there said good
bye, as Jane went tripping over the common towards the village.
In a moment she cried “Peleg! Peleg!”

Peleg ran to meet her when she whispered, as if the wind
must not catch the sound and bear it to other ears.

“I've thought of something, Peleg—I've something to tell
you, Peleg—but I won't tell it now—to-morrow, Peleg, to-morrow.”

And although the boy made an effort to detain her, in a
moment she was tripping across the common again. Peleg could
not imagine why Jane should not tell him then, if she had any
thing important to communicate, nor was he able to conjecture
what she might have to tell him. He went back to the cottage,
but said nothing of Jane's conduct, determined that until he
knew her secret, he would keep his own.

When Jane reached home, she found that her father and
mother had just taken dinner, and were in the parlor. She ate
her dinner in haste, fearing that her father would go the store
before she could see him. When she was ready to enter the

parlor, he was still at home, however, and she greeted him in
her most pleasant manner.

“And where have you been roaming to-day, Jane?” inquired
Mr. Pridore.

“I went to Mr. Brown's funeral.”

“The Brown's have become great favorites of yours, Jane.'

“They are nice people, father, and I could not neglect the
mother, and that honest little boy, just because Mr. Brown was
a drunkard.”

“Well—well, Jane, you can't be Frank, and I suppose
you must have your whims; I don't expect much of you.”

“Now, pa, don't be cross, or scold me to-day,” said Jane,
walking up confidently to her father, and placing her hand on
his knees, “I have something to ask of you.”

Mr. Pridore was a man, who, with all his harshness to
Jane, loved to indulge her. He was touched by her winning
manner, and said, smiling,—

“Well, Jane, I am not in a bad humor, and it would not
be strange if I granted you a favor, notwithstanding you have
been a truant to-day.”

“No, pa; mother said I might go to the funeral; but I
don't want to ask anything for myself. I heard one of the
clerks say, this morning, that a boy was needed at the store.
Wont you let that little Peleg Brown, come? He'll work
hard, father, and I know he's honest.”

“Well—well, Jane,” said Mr. Pridore, I should think you
were getting familiar with the Browns. The first we know,
this little Peleg will be a beau of yours: a drunkard's son waiting
upon my daughter!”

“No—no, father; I am sure I never thought of having a
beau. I don't want a beau,” interrupted Jane, in her simplicity,
not seeing the bearing of her father's objections. “But,

pa, do give this boy a place. He supports his mother, and
I'm sure he's honest.”

“You've set your heart on it, Jane. Perhaps I'll take this
fellow: I'll see about it this evening.”

“Thank you, pa; not for myself, but for the poor boy's
widowed mother,” said Jane; following her father, as he
walked through the hall, on his way to the counting-room of
the firm of Pridore & Co.

Whether Mr. Pridore made any inquiries respecting Peleg
Brown, he never chose to disclose; but certain it is that, on the
morrow, Jane sent a note to the boy which, when he opened
it, with beating heart, and glistening eye, he found to contain
the following words:

“Dear Peleg:—I could not come to see you to-day, and
tell you that secret, so I have sent this note. You are to live
at our house—no, you are to work in the store, and live at
home if you please. Will you come? Don't say no. I got
the place for you, from pa. Come this afternoon. Pa will tell
you what you must do, in the evening: he is so kind.—Jane.”

“Mother—mother!” cried Peleg, after he had read the
note over and over again, half a dozen times, “mother, oh
mother! see here—I told you I should be rich—I know I
shall. See here—see what that little girl, not bigger than I
am, and not as old, has done for me. I couldn't do anything
for myself or you, but saw wood and run errands; but mother,
see what Jane has done. Oh! I never thought it; but now I
will do something for myself, mother, and for you. I will be
rich, and I'll have a store of my own some day, and then I'll
give poor boys a chance; and good boys, whose fathers are
dead, like mine, shall have the first chance. Oh! mother, we
shall be so happy: don't you think we shall?”

“Yes, my child,” said Mrs. Brown, who, during Peleg's

rhapsody, had read the note; “I am glad you have got this
place: Jane is very kind to us.”

“Indeed she is, mother. I love her so. I'll be a brother
to her—more than a borther.”

Mrs. Brown looked at her boy with a singular expression;
she felt the meaning of his words, but knew that he did not,
and she was compelled to think that when he did understand
their true import, they might be to him the talisman of his
severest trial.

In a few days little Peleg was regularly installed, assistant
clerk, with the duties of an errand boy, in the store of Pridore &
Co. His salary was a meager one, but he was accustomed to
frugality.

He performed his duties, for nearly a year, with such strict
assiduity and excellent judgment, that he was more rapidly promoted
than boys of his age usually are in extensive stores, and
before the end of the first quarter of the second year, he was considered
one of the most useful and trustworthy sales-men of the
establishment. He had not been in the employment of Pridore
& Co. a year and a half, when he was made assistant bookkeeper,
with an increased salary.

Jane had watched the promotions of her little friend with
much interest, but, that he might hold her father's favor, she
said nothing about him, unless spoken to in reference to his conduct.

Peleg often wondered why Jane was not as familiar with
him, as she had been when he was a wood-sawyer, but as he
grew older, he felt that they could not be brother and sister, except
in such circumstances as placed them socially for ever apart,
and whenever he had reason to rejoice over prosperity, he would
go to his trunk, and taking out Jane's note, which had been
most carefully treasured, he would again peruse it with a beating

heart and glistening eye, and say, as he had said to his mother,
when he read this note for the first time.

“I will be rich—I know I will.”

One afternoon, Peleg was arranging some accounts in a
private room, when Frank Pridore paid him a visit.

“Come little Brown,” said he, “You never have been one
of us, but you must come out to-night, this is my twenty-first
birth-day. After the party at father's to-night, where you will
be, of course, the boys in the store will adjourn down town for a
grand spree. You will join us this once. You shan't back
out.”

“You will excuse me, Mr. Pridore,” said Peleg, mildly.

“No, I won't excuse you,” answered Frank shortly, “I
won't do any such thing.”

“I have never been on a spree,” said Peleg.

“You needn't spree, if you don't want to,” returned Frank,
“but you shall go.” “I cannot go,” returned Peleg, firmly,
“I would not countenance a spree by my presence.”

“Ah! I remember,” said Frank, “you are one of these
timid fools of wine, afraid of being a drunkard. I'm not; I need
not get drunk unless I want to. My father did not die a
drunkard.”

“These are hard words, Mr. Pridore,” answered Peleg,
with a trembling voice; “if you live many years you will
repent them; but I forgive you now, for your sister's sake.”

“Pooh!” cried Frank, with a sneer. “She's another of
your canters, who think there's death in a social glass of wine.
We wanted no empty chairs at our feast to-night, but empty
chairs are better than canting fellows, who have no sociability.
Good day, Mr. Temperance Preacher.”

Peleg's heart was heavy when Frank left him. He did
not care for the sneers thrown at him, but associations were

awakened, which ever carry a bitter sting to the sensitive heart.
He determined that he would not attend the birth-night party
at Mr. Pridore's, an invitation to which had been given him by
Frank, at Jane's solicitation. When he left the store after the
work of the day was over, he despatched a note to Jane, in
these words:—

Jane did not receive this note until she had been expecting
Peleg for some time. She flew to Frank for an explanation.

“Bravo!” he answered, when he had read the note.
“Bravo! I like the fellow's spunk. He forgives the inestimable
pleasure of seeing you, Jane, because when he refused to join
the boys in a jubilee after the party, I told him he was afraid of
being a drunkard, like his father.”

“You were naughty,” said Jane, in a tone which, had not
the brother been flushed with wine, he would long have remembered.
“It was unworthy of my brother; I would not
have come here to-night, if I had been in Mr. Brown's place.”

“To be sure you would not; you and he would make a
good match. But yonder's a party drinking bumpers to me; I
cannot waste time with you, Jane.”

Frank was gone to join his wine-drinking companions. As
she saw him drink glass after glass, Jane thought of what she
had once said to Peleg about doing something for her folks some
day, and she pressed closer the little note she had that evening
received, and wished—.

When Peleg had taken supper with his mother, and many
times refused to confide to her the cause of a manifest depression

of spirits, he walked down into the village, found his way to his
little room back of the store, and, taking up an engaging book,
read and thought, and calculated, till a late hour. It was after
midnight when he began to retrace his steps to the cottage. As
he sauntered slowly through a portion of the village sparsely
inhabited, he observed a man lying across the dilapidated steps
of an untenanted building. He stooped to look at the unfortunate
being, and ascertain whether he was intoxicated, or had
been physically injured by ruffians, when something familiar
about the dress arrested his attention. He dragged the apparently
lifeless body towards a hotel a few rods distant, and by
the light reflected from the bar-room, was able to discover that
he had found—as it were, dead in the street—the only son of his
employer. His birth-night spree had been too much for Frank
Pridore: he had entered manfully upon the year of his majority.

Peleg was grieved and bewildered—grieved to find young
Pridore in such a situation, and bewildered in respect to his duty
towards him and the family. He forgot all the harsh words
Frank had said to him, and determined that he would endeavor
to get him to his father's house without calling such assistance
as might make public the young man's degradation. He applied
at the hotel, and succeeded in arousing the ostler, who, for
half a week's wages, consented to assist Peleg. Frank was
borne home. When they approached the Pridore mansion,
Peleg dismissed his “help,” and knowing the appointments of
the house, he awakened a servant without arousing the family,
and told him that he wished to see Mr. Pridore on important
business, and that he must be awakened without alarming any
other member of the household. The servant was faithful—he
had often discharged such duties—and Mr. Pridore soon met
Peleg, who conducted him to Frank, and explained the circumstances
under which he had been found.

The services of the servant who had awakened Mr. Pridore
were further required, and Frank was secretly conveyed into
the house, and silently placed in his own bed. When Peleg
departed from Mr. Pridore, the latter said:

“I am deeply indebted to you for your discretion; neither
Miss nor Mrs. Pridore must know a word of this.”

“I have only done my duty, sir,” returned Peleg; “
should respect your feelings.”

Mr. Pridore wished Frank had fallen into the care of any
young man of the village, rather than Peleg Brown. As he
stood by the bedside of his drunken son, he thought of the time
when he knew John Brown, who died a drunkard, to be a
wealthy and respectable man; he thought of the Christmas-day
Peleg sawed wood in his yard, and he reflected on the encouragement
he then gave his now drunken boy, to take freely of
that which had degraded him.

These were bitter thoughts for an over-indulgent father.