Temperance > Autobiography and personal recollections of John B. Gough

38 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF JOHN B. GOUGH.
two dollars and twenty-five cents, per week, and to board
myself. Mr. Dando recommended me as a boarder to
a Mrs. M., in William Street, at the rate of two dollars
weekly; and low as were the terms, the reader will pre¬
sently agree with me in thinking that it was far too much
for the accommodation I received. To my surprise, I
found, when the hour of rest approached, that I was to
share a bed with an Irishman, who was lying very sick
of fever and ague. The poor fellow told me his little
history; I experienced the truth of the saying, that
“ poverty makes us acquainted with strange bed-fellows.”
He had emigrated to America, been attacked with the
disease I have mentioned, and now was out of money, but
daily in the expectation of receiving some from his friends.
My companion shivered so much, and was so restless
during the night, that I was wretchedly disturbed; and
next day I told my landlady that I could not possibly
sleep in the same bed with the Irishman again. Accord¬
ingly the next night she made me up a wretched couch,
in the same room, under the rafters. 11 was hard enough,
and what is called a cat’s-tail bed; and so miserably situ¬
ated was it, that when I stretched my hand out to pull
up the scanty supply of bed-clothes, my fingers would
encounter the half-glutinous webs of spiders,—a species
of insect to which I have had from childhood (and still
have) an unaccountable but deep-rooted antipathy.
Weary as I was, from want of sleep on the preceding
night, I soon fell asleep in my uneasy bed; but in the
dead of the night, frightful groans uttered by my sick
companion woke me. I started, and found, to my surprise,
that the man was up. I was dreadfully frightened,more
especially as he informed me that he feared he was going
to die. I asked him to let me call assistance; but he posi¬
tively forbade it, and then went and sat on the side of