So I said to my wife,
this afternoon, 'I'm going to bring a young lady in to see you.'
'Do you think I'm in a condition to entertain company?' she asked,
with a faint suggestion of hard cider in her tone. 'Well, my
dear,' I expostulated, 'it was just the same yesterday, and will
be a little more so to-morrow, and I feel that I shall be remiss
if I delay any longer.' 'Oh, very well,' she said, as if it were
a tooth that must come out sooner or later, 'since the matter must
be attended to, let us have it over at once.' But bless you, it
wasn't over till supper-time. As I brought the young lady in, the
baby waked out of a five-minutes' nap that had cost about an hour's
rocking, and I thought the roof would come off. My wife looked
cross and worried--well, it was prose, gentlemen, prose--not the
poetry of life; and I said to myself, 'I suppose I have about made
it certain that this young woman will live and die an old maid by
giving her this glimpse behind the scenes. I thought the ladies
could get on better without me than with me, so I bowed myself out,
glad to escape the din; and I supposed Miss Burton would say a few
pleasant things in the direction of Mrs.
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