to return home, and
remain a burden upon his friends. He, too, has caught this healthy
epidemic, and the consequence is, that he will once more gain
employment, for the production of his medal will be accepted as a
welcome proof of his reformation.

And there was there, what was better still, the unfortunate female, the
victim of passion and profligacy, conscious of her past life, and almost
ashamed in the open day to look around her. Poor thing! how her heart,
that was once innocent and pure, now trembles within a bosom where
there is awakened many a painful recollection of early youth, and the
happiness of home, before that unfortunate night, when, thrown off
her guard by accursed liquor, she ceased to rank among the pure and
virtuous. Yes, all these, and a much greater variety, were here actuated
by the noble resolution to abandon forever the evil courses, the vices,
and the profligacy into which they were first driven by the effects of
drink.

The crowd was, indeed, immense, many having come a distance of twenty,
thirty, some forty, and not a few fifty miles, in order to free
themselves, by this simple process, from the influence of the
destructive habit which either was leading, or had led them, to ruin.
Of course it is not to be supposed that among such a vast multitude
of people there were not, as there always is, a great number of those
vagabond impostors who go about from place to place, for the purpose of
extorting charity from the simple and credulous, especially when under
the influence of liquor. All this class hated the temperance movement,
because they knew right well that sobriety in the people was there
greatest enemy; the lame, the blind, the maimed, the deaf, and the dumb,
were there in strong muster, and with their characteristic ingenuity
did everything in their power, under the pretence of zeal and religious
enthusiasm, to throw discredit upon the whole proceedings. It was this
vile crew, who, by having recourse to the aid of mock miracles, fancied
they could turn the matter into derision and contempt, and who, by
affecting to be cured of their complaints, with a view of having
their own imposture, when detected, imputed to want of power in Father
Matthew;--it was this vile crew, we say, that first circulated the
notion that he could perform miracles. Unfortunately, many of the
ignorant among the people did in the beginning believe that he possessed
this power, until he himself, with his charact