Danger in the Dark - ZseZse

DANGER IN THE DARK. 97
toward God, and lost confidence in humanity, and
soon abandoned himself to recklessness and dissipation.
To the troubled heart, the oppressed and tortured
mind, there lies a powerful temptation in the winecup.
Because it offers temporary relief from gloomy
depression and the chafing effects of adversity's
waves that beat against the keen sensibilities of the
Boul-bya short-lived exhilaration, the feelings are
elated and raised above the leaden clouds, that
sometimes shut out the sunshine of hope from life'a
pathway-the poignancy of piercing grief is softened,
tribulation and disappointment forgotten. Inducements
like these, together with the influence of pernicious
examples, within the reach of which Carleton
had now cast himself, led him into intemperate
habits: some account of which, it may not be improper
to give-if the courteous reader will but consent
to pardon the digression.
"Well, well! this is a dull, monotonous world at
best, at least it seems such to me:" said Alonzo,
soliloquizingly, at the same time tossing aside a book,
with which he had been trying in vain to amuse himself;
"there's no use," continued he, "in sitting here
all day, like a moping owl-I'll take a stroll down
town, and see whether I can't, by some sort of means,
shake off this horrid ennui;" saying which, he arose,