IN STEVE MILLER’S BAR-ROOM. 59

 

then he never drank more than a single
glass. He went more for the pleasant com-
pany he found there. But, in process of
time, two evenings in the week saw the
mechanic at the tavern; and it generally
took two glasses of an evening to satisfy
his increasing desire for liquor. Three
evenings and three glasses were the next
progressive steps; and so on, until he felt
no longer contented at home a single even-
ing in the week.

The tavern-keeper, whose name was
Stephen Miller, had commenced his liquor-
selling business some ten years before, and
- was then about the poorest man in the vil-
lage. He was poor, because he was too
lazy to work steadily at his trade, which
was that of a house-carpenter. At first he
opened, in a miserable little shanty of a
place, with a few jugs of liquor, and some
bad groceries to tempt people to his shop.
He didn’t seem to do a great deal, but
somehow or ether, at the end of a year, he
was able to buy the furniture of one of the