ot confined to one day, for when I went out on what
is called a "regular spree," it was liable to be two or three days, as it
has since been two or three weeks, before I got back. Got back! Where from?
The reader knows too well.

Out on a spree! These are melancholy and heart-breaking words. Out on a
spree! Oh, how much of misery is implied! Out on a spree! Readers, every
one, I hope you will never have it said that you are out on a spree. To go
out on a spree is to throw away strength, without which the battle of life
can not be fought; it is to squander money which you may need badly for the
necessaries of life, which had better be thrown into the fire and burnt up
than spent in such a way; it is to quench the light of ambition, to crush
hope, entomb joy, lay waste the powers of the mind, neglect duty, desert
the family, and commit in the end suicide. Arson may have walked by your
side while out on a spree, red murder may have grinned, dagger in hand,
upon you, and death stalked within your shadow, ready in a thousand ways to
strike you down. Don't go out on sprees. Think of the pity of them, the
wrong, the disgrace, the remorse, the misery. Going on an occasional spree
only will not do. Some men will keep sober for weeks, and even months, but
a birthday, or a wedding, or a national holiday, or a fit of the blues, or
a streak of good luck, starts them off, and habit, like a smouldering
flame, breaks out, and for a time all is over. Such men scotch, but they do
not kill the cobra of intemperance, and soon or late the other result will
follow, the snake will kill them. The reptile is tenacious of life, and so
long as the life remains there is danger from the deadly venom of its
tooth. Those who have never formed the habit of drinking had better die at
once than live to form it. Those who have formed the habit should subdue it
and never enter into a compromise with it. The good effects of months of
abstinence may be swept away in an hour. Open the flood-gates of indulgence
never so little and the torrent will force its way through and drown every
worthy resolution. Its tide is next to resistless. Days of drunkenness
succeed, months of self-denial are lost, and deplorable results follow
everywhere. Wives are driven to desperation, mothers to despair, children
to want. Demoralization, starvation, damnation follow. Friends are
separated, homes are desolated, and souls are driven to hell itself, and
yet people will talk lightl