"Ha, ha, ha! Well done! So be it! I'll shoulder the blame, if a
respectable man like you falls by brandy."

Edward drank the contents of a glass, and, placing it upon the
table, said "We must be careful!"

"True!" said Mr. Pump, as he again filled the glass; "we cannot be
too much so. We must avoid rum and gin as we would a viper! How I
abhor the very name of rum! O, Mr. Dayton, think of the misery it
has brought upon man! I had a sister once, a beautiful, kind-hearted
creature. She was married to an industrious man; all was fair,
prospects bright. By degrees he got into bad company; he forgot his
home, loved rum more than that, became dissipated, died, and filled
a drunkard's grave! She, poor creature, went into a fever, became
delirious, raved day after day, and, heaping curses upon him who
sold her husband rum, died. Since then, I have looked upon rum as a
curse; but brandy,--it is a gentle stimulant, a healthy beverage, a
fine drink, and it can do no harm."

Onendago swallowed the contents of his glass, and Edward, who,
having taken the first, found it very easy to take the second, did
the same. Yet his conscience smote him; he felt that he was doing
wrong.

Like the innocent, unthinking bird, who, charmed by the serpent's
glistening eyes, falls an easy prey to its crushing embrace, was he
at that moment. He the bird, unconscious of the danger behind the
charm.