From Wealth to Poverty | Page 9

his aid, for here
comes a tempter.
"Hallo, Ashton, is that you? What is the matter with you? Why, one
would suppose you had an attack of the blues. At what were you
glaring so fiercely? You look as if you had a live Fenian before you and
was striking for the Old Land with a determination to give no quarter.
How came you here, and whither are you bound?" And the speaker,
with a quizzical smile upon his face, which half concealed and half
revealed an underplay of devilish mockery, put his hand familiarly
upon the shoulder of Ashton, and then grasped him by the hand and
gave it a hearty shake. But if a good judge of human nature had been by,
he would have concluded his manner was assumed for the
occasion--that he was simply acting, and was a failure at the role he had
assumed.
I have not given to the reader the expletives with which he adorned his
conversation, nor do I intend to do so, for though he, like others who
indulge in the habit of swearing, may have thought it was both
ornamental and emphatic, I don't think so. Besides, I have hopes that
these pages may be read by the young, and I do not wish to give, even
in the conversations which I may transcribe, anything that is profane or
impure; for if I did I might inoculate their young minds with an evil
virus, which I would not knowingly do.

This person, who now accosted Ashton, was the one who acted imp to
his satanic majesty in leading him to his last fall, and here he was again
to tempt him. Well would it be for you, Richard Ashton, if you would
contemptuously spurn him as you would kick a rabid dog from your
path.
I have noticed this person before in these pages but I will now give him
a more elaborate introduction to the reader; but as he is an unsavory
subject I will make the introduction as brief as possible.
His name was Stanley Ginsling, he was the youngest son of an English
gentleman, of considerable property, and of more pride, whose estate
lay in the vicinity of Ashton's native town. His father intended him for
the Church, not because there were any manifestations that he was
peculiarly qualified for holy orders, either by mental or moral
endowments, but because he did not know what else to do with him, he
concluded he would make him a parson.
So, after he had gone through a certain course by private tuition he was
sent to Eton, preparatory to going to Oxford.
He then got through his studies in some manner, though it was
generally understood by his mates that he was better acquainted with
the brands of his favorite liquors and cigars than he was with the works
of the authors which filled up the list of his college curriculum.
But when he entered Oxford he threw off all restraint and gave himself
up to a life of utter dissipation, and before long his father received a
polite note from the college authorities, intimating that to save further
disgrace he had better call his worthy son home.
After this he became a dissipated tavern lounger, a barnacle on the
good ship of society, a miserable sponge.
He soon found, as he sententiously expressed it, that it was not
agreeable for him to remain under the kindly shelter of the paternal
mansion; so he, prodigal like, took the portion his father gave him and
spent it in riotous living. But he was determined not to feed on husks, if

unmitigated cheek and unblushing effrontery could bring him better
fare.
It was while he was a gentleman lounger about town he first met
Richard Ashton, who, at that time, had become too much demoralized
to be very choice in the selection of his associates. And Ginsling was
rather intelligent--had a fine person and pleasing address, and had it not
been for his moral depravity and lack of every noble instinct, he might
have made his mark in society.
So Ashton, the ultra radical, and Ginsling, the young scion of extreme
toryism, used to fraternize in their drinking bouts, and though they
would, when sufficiently stimulated, boozily wrangle over their cups,
there was in their common dissipation a ground for mutual
understanding. But in his sober moments the radical had the most
supreme contempt for his tory associate, and, sometimes, could not
suppress its manifestation. The other, however, was too great a toady to
be too thin skinned. It was not convenient for him to be over-sensitive.
In fact he was willing to swallow such insults ad infinitum if their
donors would only furnish the wherewithall to wash them down.
After Ashton left