A certain Woman had a Drunken Husband, whom she had endeavoured to
reclaim by several ways, without effect. She, at last, tried this
stratagem: when he was brought home one night dead drunk, she ordered
him to be carried to a burial-place, and there laid in a vault, as if
he had been dead indeed. Thus she left him, and went away till she
thought he might be come to himself, and grown sober again. When she
returned, and knocked at the door of the vault, the man cried out,
who’s there? I am the person, says she, in a dismal tone of voice, that
waits upon the dead folks, and I am come to bring you some victuals.
Ah, good waiter, says he, let the victuals alone and bring me a little
drink, I beseech thee. The Woman hearing this, fell to tearing her
hair, and beating her breast in a woeful manner: Unhappy wretch that I
am, says she, this was the only way that I could think of to reform the
beastly sot; but instead of gaining my point, I am only convinced that
his drunkenness is an incurable habit, which he intends to carry with
him into the other world.