of mind was used to come upon me as I watched the world around us. I saw
men generous to their kind, industrious and brave, beloved by their
fellows; and I have seen these same men drink and dance and give
themselves to coarse, rough play like young dogs in a kennel. Yet, too,
I have seen dark things done in drink--the cheerful made morose, the
gentle violent. What was the temptation? What the secret? Was it but
the low craving of the flesh, or was it some primitive unrest, or craving
of the soul, which, clouded and baffled by time and labour and the wear
of life, by this means was given the witched medicament--a false freedom,
a thrilling forgetfulness? In ancient days the high, the humane, in
search of cure for poison, poisoned themselves, and then applied the
antidote. He hath little knowledge and less pity for sin who has never
sinned. The day came when all these things which other men did in my
sight I did--openly. I drank with them in the taverns--twice I drank.
I met a lass in the way. I kissed her. I sat beside her at the roadside
and she told me her brief, sad, evil story. One she had loved had left
her. She was going to London. I gave her what money I had--"

"And thy watch," said a whispering voice from the Elders' bench.

"Even so. And at the cross-roads I bade her goodbye with sorrow."

"There were those who saw," said the shrill voice from the bench.

"They saw what I have said--no more. I had never tasted spirits in my
life. I had never kissed a woman's lips. Till then I had never struck
my fellow-man; but before the sun went down I fought the man who drove
the lass in sorrow into the homeless world. I did not choose to fight;
but when I begged the man Jasper Kimber for the girl's sake to follow and
bring her back, and he railed at me and made to fight me, I took off my