st she
might.

The months flew by. Mike Bogan was a middle-aged man, and he and his
wife looked somewhat elderly as they went to their pew in the broad
aisle on Sunday morning. Danny usually came too, and the girls, but
Dan looked contemptuous as he sat next his father and said his prayers
perfunctorily. Sometimes he was not there at all, and Mike had a heavy
heart under his stiff best coat. He was richer than any other member
of Father Miles's parish, and he was known and respected everywhere as
a good citizen. Even the most ardent believers in the temperance cause
were known to say that little mischief would be done if all the
rumsellers were such men as Mr. Bogan. He was generous and in his
limited way public spirited. He did his duty to his neighbor as he saw
it. Every one used liquor more or less, somebody must sell it, but a
low groggery was as much a thing of shame to him as to any man. He
never sold to boys, or to men who had had too much already. His shop
was clean and wholesome, and in the evening when a dozen or more of
his respectable acquaintances gathered after work for a social hour or
two and a glass of whiskey to rest and cheer them after exposure,
there was not a little good talk about affairs from their point of
view, and plenty of honest fun. In their own houses very likely the
rooms were close and hot, and the chairs hard and unrestful. The wife
had taken her bit of recreation by daylight and visited her friends.
This was their comfortable club-room, Mike Bogan's shop, and Mike
himself the leader of the assembly. There was a sober-mindedness in
the man; his companions were contented though he only looked on
tolerantly at their fun, for the most part, without taking any active
share himself.

One cool October evening the company was well gathered in, there was
even a glow of wood fire in the stove, and two of the old men were
sitting close beside it. Corny Sullivan had been a soldier in the
British army for many years, he had been wounded at last at
Sebastopol, and yet here he was, full of military lore and glory, and
propped by a wooden leg. Corny was usually addressed an Timber-toes by
his familiars; he was an irascible old follow to deal with, but as
clean as a whistle from long habit and even stately to look at in his
arm-chair. He had a nephew with whom he made his home, who would give
him an arm presently and get him home to bed. His mate was an old
sailor much bent in the back by rheumatism