Page:Robert Carter- his life and work. 1807-1889 (IA robertcarterhis00coch).pdf/155

Rh that the poor creature had not come. After five months he came again in as bad a plight as before, and I asked why he had not gone to the shop as he had been invited. He said he could not pass a grog-shop without a glass, and he went in and drank till the money I gave him was gone. I tried to reason with him, told him he had a good education and good example in his father’s house. He said, ‘You are mistaken; I was not well educated. We had whiskey at table in my father’s house every day, and I learned to love it then.’

“Here was a striking contrast. The daughter of a wretched father and the son of a leading clergyman had changed places, and what a change! How many since that time have I seen swept into the vortex of destruction by this horrid vice! O, what heaps of slain call out for vengeance on us! And yet the giddy dance of death goes round.”

In the summer of 1855 Mr. Carter went for the first time to Sharon Springs, New York. In this place he spent six summers, attracting there relatives and friends till there was often a party of sixty or seventy which gravitated round him as a centre. The society was delightful. There were always a good many clergymen in the house, sometimes eight or nine at a time,—Rev. Drs. Krebs, Nicholas Murray, Cleveland, and his own beloved pastor Dr. McElroy; Mr. Chauncey Goodrich and Prof. O. M. Mitchell, the eminent astronomer, were friends with whom he there had most delightful communion. Archbishop Hughes of the Roman Catholic Church was there one summer, and they had much pleasant intercourse with each other, talking over things ancient and modern. They found much common ground, but did not hesitate to discuss amicably controverted points, such as Pascal and the Port