Читать книгу True to his Colours - Theodore P. Wilson - Страница 6

The express train which passed through Crossbourne station between ten and eleven o’clock on the night when Joe Wright met with his sad end, arrived in London about three a.m. the following morning. It was heavily laden, for it conveyed a large number of persons from the north, who were coming up to the metropolis to spend Christmas with their friends.

From a first-class carriage about the middle of the train there emerged a heap of coats and wraps, surmounted by a fur cap, the whole enclosing a gentleman of middle age and middle height, with black beard and moustache, and gold-rimmed spectacles.

“Cab, sir?” asked the porter who opened the door.

“If you please.”

“Any luggage, sir?”

“Yes; it was put on the roof of my carriage.”

“All right, sir; I’ll see to it if you’ll get into the cab.”

So the gentleman, who was John Prosser, PhD, got into the cab which was waiting for him; and having seen that his luggage was all brought to the conveyance, threw himself into a corner and closed his eyes, having given his direction to the driver as he was stepping into the vehicle.

“Stop a moment, Jim,” said the porter to the cabman, as the latter was just jerking his reins for a start. “Here, catch hold of this bag; it was on the top of this gent’s carriage: no one else owns to it, so it must be his’n. The gent’s forgotten it, I dessay.”

So saying, he threw a light, shabby-looking carpet-bag up to the driver, who deposited it by his side, and drove off.

After sleeping for a few hours at a hotel where he was well-known, and having urgent business in the city next morning, the doctor deposited his luggage, which he had left with sundry rugs and shawls in charge of the hotel night porter, at his own door on his way to keep his business appointment, leaving word that he should be at home in the afternoon. With the other luggage there was handed in the shabby-looking carpet-bag which had come with it.

“What’s this?” asked the boy-in-buttons, in a tone of disgust, of the housemaid, as he touched the bag with his outstretched foot.

“I don’t know, I’m sure,” was the reply. “It ain’t anything as master took with him, and I’m quite sure it don’t belong to mistress.”

“I’ll tell you what it is,” said the boy abruptly, and in a solemn voice, “it’s something as has to do with science. There’s something soft inside it, I can feel. P’raps there’s something alive in it—I shouldn’t wonder. Oh! P’raps there’s gun-cotton in it. I’d take care how I carried it if I was you, Mary, or p’raps it’ll go off and blow you to bits!”

“Oh goodness!” exclaimed the housemaid, “I won’t touch it. Just you take it yourself and put it into master’s study; it’ll be safest there.”

So the boy, with a grin of extreme satisfaction at the success of his assault on the housemaid’s nerves, helped her to carry the rest of the luggage upstairs, and then deposited the mysterious bag in a corner of the doctor’s own special sanctum. Now this study was a room worth describing, and yet not very easy to describe.

The doctor’s house itself was one of those not very attractive-looking dwellings which are to be found by streetfuls running from square to square in the west end of London. It had stood patiently there for many a long year, as was evident from the antiquated moulding over the doorway, and from a great iron extinguisher, in which the link-bearers of old used to quench their torches, which formed part of the sombre-coloured ironwork that skirted the area. The gloomy monotony of the street was slightly relieved by a baker’s shop at one corner and a chemist’s at the other. But for these, the general aspect would have been one of unbroken dinginess.

Nor did the interior of the doctor’s house present a much livelier appearance.

The entrance-hall, which was dark and narrow, had rather a sepulchral smell about it, which was not otherwise than in keeping with some shelves of books at the farther end—the overflow apparently of the doctor’s library; the tall, dark volumes therein looking like so many tombs of the dead languages.

To the left, as you entered the hall, was a dining-room massively furnished, adorned with a few family portraits, and as many vigorous engravings. But there lacked that indescribable air of comfort which often characterises those rooms devoted to the innocent and social refreshment of the body at meal-times. The chairs, though in themselves all that dining-room chairs ought to be, did not look as if on a habitual good understanding with one another; some were against the wall, and others stood near the table, and at irregular distances, as though they never enjoyed that cozy fraternity so desirable in well-conditioned seats. Books, too, lay about in little zigzag heaps; while a bunch of keys, a pair of lady’s gloves, and a skein of coloured wool lay huddled together on the centre of the sideboard. The whole arrangement, or rather disarrangement, of the room bespoke, on the part of the presiding female management, an indifference to those minor details of order and comfort a due attention to which makes home (a genuine English home) the happiest spot in the world.

Opposite to this room, on the other side of the hall, was another of similar size, used apparently as a sort of reception-room. Huge book-shelves occupied two of the walls, an orrery stood against a third, while dusty curiosities filled up the corners. There was something peculiarly depressing about the general appearance and tone of this apartment—nothing bright, nothing to suggest cheerful and happy thoughts—plenty of food for the mind, but presented in such an indigestible form as was calculated to inflict on the consumer intellectual nightmare. This room was known as the library.

But we pass on to the doctor’s own special room—the study. This was beyond and behind the dining-room. Book-shelves towered on all sides, filled with volumes of all sizes, and in nearly all languages, some in exquisitely neat white vellum binding, with Tome One, Tome Two, etcetera, in shining gold on their backs—the products of an age when a conscientiousness could be traced in the perfect finish of all the details of a work external or internal; some in the form of stately folios, suggestive at once both of the solidity and depth of learning possessed by the writers and expected in the readers; while a multitude of lesser volumes were crowded together, some erect, others lying flat, or leaning against one another for support. Greek and Latin classic authors, and in all languages poets, historians, and specially writers on science were largely represented—even French and German octavoes standing at ease in long regiments side by side, suggestive of no Franco-Prussian war, but only of an intellectual contest, arising out of amicable differences of opinion. On one side of the principal bookcase was an electrical machine, and on the other an air-pump; while a rusty sword and a pair of ancient gauntlets served as links to connect the warlike past with the pacific present. In the centre of the room was a large leather-covered writing-table, on which lay a perfect chaos of printed matter and manuscript; while bottles of ink, red, black, and blue, might be seen emerging from the confusion like diminutive forts set there to guard the papers from unlearned and intrusive fingers. Order was clearly not the doctor’s “first law;” and certainly it must have required no common powers of memory to enable him, when seated in front of the confusion he himself had made, to lay his hand upon any particular book or manuscript which might claim his immediate attention. On either side of a small fire-place at the rear of the table, and above it, hung charts, historical, geological, and meteorological; while a very dim portrait of some friend of the doctor, or perhaps of some literary celebrity, looked down from over the doorway through a haze of venerable dust on the scientific labours which it could neither share nor lighten.

In the corner of the room farthest from the door was a little closet, seldom opened, secured by a patent lock, whose contents no one was acquainted with save the doctor himself. The housemaid, whose duties in this room were confined to an occasional wary sweeping and dusting, and fire-lighting in the winter season, would keep at a respectful distance from this closet, or pass it with a creeping dread; for the boy-in-buttons had thrown out dark suggestions that it probably contained the skulls of murderers, or, at the least, snakes and scorpions preserved in spirits, or even possibly alive, and ready to attack any daring intruder on their privacy.

Such were Dr. John Prosser’s home and study.

It was just four o’clock in the afternoon of the 24th of December when the doctor returned to his house from the city.

“Is your mistress at home?” he asked of the boy.

“No, sir; she told me to tell you that she was gone to a meeting of the school board.”

The doctor’s countenance fell. He was evidently disappointed; and no wonder, for he had been away from his home for the last ten days, and felt keenly the absence of his wife, and of a loving greeting on his return.

“Any letters for me, William?” he asked.

“Yes, sir, they’re on your table; and, please, sir, I’ve put the little carpet-bag into your study.”

“Carpet-bag! What carpet-bag?” asked his master.

“Why, sir, the little bag as came with your luggage. We didn’t take it upstairs, because it’s nothing as you took with you when you left home, and Mary says it don’t belong to mistress; so I thought it would be better to put it into your study till you came home, as it might be something particular. It’s in the corner by the fire-place, sir.”

“Well, well, never mind,” was the reply; “let me know when your mistress comes in,” and the doctor retired to his sanctum.

Drawing up his chair to the table, he was soon deep in his letters; but turning round to poke the fire, his eye fell on the little bag. “How can I have come by this, I wonder? And what can it be?” he said to himself, as he took it up and turned it round and round. It was fastened by an ordinary padlock, which easily opened on the application of one of the doctor’s keys. “Nothing but waste paper,” he said, as he turned out a portion of the contents, which appeared to consist merely of pieces of newspaper and brown paper crumpled up. “Pshaw! Some foolish hoax or practical joke intended for me, or somebody else, perhaps!” he exclaimed. “Well, it seems scarcely worth making any trouble about; but if it has come here by mistake, and is of sufficient value, there will be inquiries or an advertisement about it.” So saying, he replaced the crumpled papers, locked the bag again, and opening his closet, placed it on one of the upper shelves, where it must rest for a while and gather dust.

When Dr. Prosser had finished reading his letters, and had answered such as needed an immediate reply, he betook himself to the drawing-room. This was a large apartment, occupying upstairs the same area as the library, hall, and dining-room. It was handsomely furnished, bearing marks in every direction of a highly cultivated taste and of woman’s handiwork. Yet there was wanting that peculiar air of comfort which gives a heart—cheering glow alike to the humblest cottage parlour and the elegant saloon of the man of wealth and refinement. Indeed, it might truly be said that the room abounded in everything that could be devised, but comfort. Like a picture full of brilliant colouring, the various hues of which need blending and toning down, so the articles of luxury and beauty lavishly scattered about Dr. Prosser’s drawing-room, though tastefully selected, seemed calculated rather to call forth the passing admiration of friends and strangers than to give abiding pleasure to their possessors.

At present there was certainly something very discouraging about the whole appearance of things in the eyes of the doctor, as he entered the costly furnished apartment. A fire, it is true, twinkled between the bars of the grate; but its few feeble sparks, in contrast with the prevailing surroundings of black coal and cinders, were suggestive to the feelings rather of the chilliness they were meant to counteract than of the warmth which they were designed to impart. Near the fire was a dwarf, round, three-legged table, on which lay a manuscript in a female hand. The doctor took it up, and laid it down with a sigh. It was a portion of a long-since-begun and never-likely-to-be-finished essay on comparative anatomy. A heap of unanswered letters lay on a taller table close by, having displaced a work-basket, whose appearance of superlative neatness showed how seldom the fingers of its gentle owner explored or made use of its homely stores. A grand piano stood near the richly curtained windows. It was open. A vocal duet occupied the music-rest, and various other pieces for voice and instrument were strewed along the highly polished top. Near the piano was a harp, while a manuscript book of German and Italian songs was placed upon an elegant stand near it, and other pieces filled a gaping portfolio at the foot. On a beautifully inlaid table in the centre of the room was an unfinished water-colour drawing, propped up by a pile of richly gilded and ornamented books. The drawing, with its support, had been pushed back towards the middle of the table, to make way for a sheet or two of note-paper containing portions of a projected poem. And the presiding and inspiring genius of all this beautiful confusion was Agnes Prosser.

And did she make her husband happy? Well, it was taken for granted by friends and acquaintance that she did—or, at any rate, that it must be his fault if she did not; and so the poor doctor thought himself. He was proud of his wife, and considered that he ought to be thoroughly happy with her; but somehow or other, he was not so. She was, in the common acceptation of the words, highly accomplished, of an amiable and loving disposition, graceful and winning in person and manner, able to take the head of his table to the entire satisfaction of himself and his friends, and capable of conversing well on every subject with all who were invited to her house, or whom she met in society elsewhere.

What could her husband want more? He did want something more—his heart asked and yearned for something more. What was it? He could hardly distinctly tell. Nevertheless he felt himself on this afternoon—he had been gradually approaching the feeling for some time past—a disappointed man. Perhaps it was his own fault, he thought; yet so it was.

He was now just forty years of age, and had been married three years. His wife was some ten years younger than himself. He had looked well round him before making choice of one with whom he was to share the joys and sorrows of a domestic life. He was a man who thoroughly respected religion, and could well discriminate between the genuine servant of Christ and the mere sounding professor, while at the same time scientific studies had rather tended to make him undervalue clear dogmatic teaching as set forth in the revealed Word of God. Yet he was too profound a thinker to adopt that popular scepticism which is either the refuge of those who, consciously or unconsciously, use it as a screen, though it proves but a semi-transparent one at the best, to shut out the light of a coming judgment, or the halting-place of thinkers who stop short of the only source of true and infallible wisdom—the revealed mind of God. His wife, too, had been taught religiously, and cordially assented to the truths of the gospel, though the constraining love of Christ was yet wanting; and both she and her husband were intimate friends of one whose path had ever been since they had known it, “the path of the just, like the shining light, that shineth more and more unto the perfect day:” and that one was Ernest Maltby, now vicar of Crossbourne.

So Dr. Prosser had chosen his wife well. And yet he was disappointed in her; and why? Just because he had made the mistake—and how common a mistake it is in these days—of supposing that accomplishments acquired and a highly cultivated mind make the model woman, wife, and mother. Surely the mistake is a sad and fatal one—fatal to woman’s highest happiness and truest usefulness; fatal to her due fulfilment of the part which her loving Creator designed her to fulfil in this world!

There are two concentric circles in which we all move, an inner or domestic circle, an outer or social circle. We are too often educating our women merely for the outer circle. We crowd the mind and memory with knowledge of all sorts, that they may shine in society: we forget to teach them first and foremost how to make home happy. It was so with Mrs. Prosser. She had overstrained her mind with the burden of a multitude of acquirements and accomplishments, which had not, after all, made her truly accomplished. One or two things for which she had real taste and ability thoroughly mastered would have been a far greater source of delight to her husband, and of satisfaction to herself, than the mere handful of unripe fruit which she had gathered from a dozen different branches of the tree of knowledge, and in the collecting of which she had, in a measure, impaired the elasticity of her mind and her bodily strength, and found no time for making herself mistress of a thousand little undemonstrative acquirements which tend to keep a steady light of joy and peace burning daily and hourly in the home.

What wonder, then, that, when a little one came to gladden the hearts of those who were already fondly attached to each other, the poor mother was unable to do justice to her child. Partly nourished by a stranger, and partly brought up by hand, and missing those numberless little attentions which either ignorance or a mind otherwise occupied prevented Mrs. Prosser from giving to the frail being who had brought into the world with it a delicacy of constitution due, in a considerable degree, to its mother’s overstrain of mind and body, the baby pined and drooped, and, spite of medicine, prayers, and tears, soon closed its weary eyes on a world which had used it but roughly, to wing its way into a land unclouded by sin or sorrow.

How keenly he felt the loss of his child the doctor dared not say, especially to his wife, entertaining as he did a painful misgiving that she had hardly done her duty by it; while on the mother’s heart there rested an abiding burden, made doubly heavy by a dreadful consciousness of neglect on her part—a burden which no lapse of time could ever wholly remove. Thus a stationary shadow brooded over that home where all might have been unclouded sunshine.

Dr. Prosser was disappointed; for he had hoped to find in his wife, not merely or chiefly an intellectual and highly educated companion, but one in whose society he could entirely unbend—one who would make his home bright by causing him to forget for a while science and the busy whirl of the world in the beautiful womanly tendernesses which rejoice a husband’s heart, and smooth out the wrinkles from his brow.

It was, then, as a disappointed man that Dr. Prosser sat with his feet on the drawing-room polished fender with his chair tilted back. Moodily gazing at the cheerless fire, he had become sunk deep in absorbing meditation, when a rushing step on the stairs roused him from his reverie, and scattered for the time all painful thoughts.

“My dear, dear John, how delighted I am to see you back; I hardly expected you so soon!” exclaimed Agnes Prosser, after exchanging a most loving salutation with her husband.

“Why, I thought,” was the answer, with somewhat of reproach in its tone, “that you knew I should be here this afternoon.”

“Oh yes; but hardly so soon. Well, I am so sorry; it was too bad not to be at home to welcome you. And, I declare, they’ve nearly let the fire out. What can that stupid boy have been about? And the room in such confusion too! Well, dearest, you shan’t find it so again. Just ring the bell, please, and we’ll make ourselves comfortable.—William,” to the boy who answered the summons, “bring up a cup of tea, and a glass of sherry, and the biscuit box.—You’ll like a cup of tea, John.—And, by-the-by, William, tell Mrs. Lloyd I should like dinner half an hour earlier.—You won’t mind dinner at half-past five to-day, dearest?”

“No, my dear Agnes, not if it is more convenient to yourself.”

“Why, the fact is, I’ve promised to meet a select committee of ladies this evening at seven o’clock, at Lady Strong’s.”

“What!—this evening!” exclaimed her husband. “Why, it’s Christmas-eve! Whatever can these good ladies want with one another to-night away from their own firesides?”

“Ah now, John, that’s a little hit at your poor wife. But a man with your high sense of duty ought not to say so. You know it must be ‘duty first, and pleasure afterwards.’ ”

“True, Agnes, where the duty is one plainly laid upon us, but not where it is of one’s own imposing. I can’t help thinking that a wife’s first and chief duties lie at home.”

“Oh, now, you mustn’t look grave like that, and scold me. I ordered a fly to call for me at a quarter to seven, and I shan’t be gone much more than an hour, I daresay. And you can have a good long snooze by the dining-room fire while I’m away. I know how you enjoy a snooze.”

William now appearing with the tray, she passed the tea to her husband, and took the glass of sherry herself. A cloud settled for a moment on the doctor’s brow. He wished that the constant drain on his wife’s energies, physical and mental, could be restored by something less perilous than these stimulants, resorted to, he could see, with increasing frequency. But she always assured him that nothing so reinvigorated her as just one glass of sherry.

“And what are these good ladies going to meet about?” he asked, when the tray had been removed.

“Oh, you’ll laugh, I daresay, when I tell you,” she replied; “but I assure you that they are all good and earnest workers. We are going to discuss the best way of improving the homes of the working-classes.”

“Well,” said the doctor, laughing, but with a touch of mingled sarcasm and bitterness in his voice, “I think your committee can’t do better than advise the working-women of England generally to make their homes more attractive to their husbands, and to lead the way yourselves.”

“My dearest John,” exclaimed his wife, a little taken aback, “you are cruelly hard upon us poor ladies. I declare you’re getting positively spiteful. I think we’d better change the subject.—How did you leave our dear friends the Johnsons? And what are they doing in the north about the ‘strikes’ and ‘trades-unions’?”

“Really,” he replied wearily, “I must leave the ‘strikes’ and such things to take care of themselves just now. The Johnsons send their love. They were all well, and most kind and hospitable. But, my dearest wife, I feel concerned about yourself; you look fagged and pale. Come, sit down for a few minutes, and tell me all about it. There, the fire’s burning up a bit; and now that I have got you for a while, I must not let you slip through my fingers. Just lay your bonnet down; you’ll have plenty of time to dress for dinner. I don’t like these evening meetings. I am sure they are good for neither mind nor body. You’ll wear yourself out.”

“Oh, nonsense, dear John; I never was better than I am now—only a little tired now and then. But surely we are put into this world to do good; and it is better to wear out than to rust out.”

“Not a doubt of it, my dearest Agnes; but it is quite possible to keep the rust away without wearing yourself out at all; and, still more, without wearing yourself out prematurely. At the rate you are going on now, you will finish up your usefulness in a few years at the farthest, instead of extending it, please God, over a long and peaceful life.”

Mrs. Prosser was silent for a few moments, and then she said: “Are you not a little unreasonable, dear John? What would you have me give up? If all were of your mind, what would become of society?”

“Why, in that case, I believe that society would find itself on a much safer foundation, and surrounded by a much healthier atmosphere. But come, now, tell me, what are your engagements for next week?”

“Why, not so many. To-morrow is Christmas-day, you know, and the next day is Sunday, so that I shall have quite a holiday, and a fine time for recruiting.”

“Good! And what on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, etcetera?”

“Let me see, John. On Monday and Thursday mornings Clara Thompson and her sister come here, and we read French, German, and Italian together; and on Monday evening we meet at Clara’s mother’s to practise for the amateur concert. On Tuesday morning I have promised to help poor Miss Danvers.”

“Miss Danvers! Why, what help can she need from you?”

“Come, dearest John, don’t be unfeeling; she is over head and ears in debt, and—”

“And do you mean that you are going to take her liabilities upon yourself?”

“Nonsense, John; you are laughing at me; it isn’t kind. I had not finished my sentence. She is overwhelmed with letter-debts, poor thing; and I promised to go and help her with her correspondence. You know we are told in the Bible to ‘bear one another’s burdens.’ ”

“True, my dearest wife; but the same high authority, if I remember rightly, bids us do our own business first. But what has entailed such an enormous amount of correspondence on Miss Danvers?”

“Only her anxiety to do good. She is secretary to some half-dozen ladies’ societies for meeting all sorts of wants and troubles.—Ah! I see that cruel smile again on your face; but positively you must not laugh at me nor her. I am sure she is one of the noblest women I know.”

“I won’t question it for a moment, but I wish she could contrive to keep her benevolence within such reasonable limits as would allow her to transact her own business without taxing her friends. Anything more on Tuesday?”

“Nothing more, dearest, on Tuesday, away from home; but of course you know that I have to work hard at my essay, my music, my drawing, and my little poem. I see you shrug your shoulders, but you must not be hard upon me. Why was I taught all these things if I am to make no use of them?”

“Why, indeed?” were the words which rose to the doctor’s lips, but he did not utter them. He only smiled sadly, and asked, “What of Wednesday?”

“There, John, perhaps you had better look for yourself,” she said, rather piqued at his manner, and taking a little card from her pocket-book, she handed it to him.

Pressing her left hand lovingly in his own, he took the card from her, and read:—

“ ‘Engagements. Wednesday, 11 a.m. Meet the professor at Mrs. Maskelyne’s.’—Mrs. Maskelyne! That’s your strong-minded friend who goes in for muscular Christianity and vivisection! I’m very glad we don’t keep a pet terrier or spaniel!”—“Ah, John, you may laugh, but she’s a wonderful woman!”—“ ‘Wonderful!’ perhaps so, dear Agnes—an ‘awful’ woman, I should say; that’s only a term expressive of a different kind of admiration.—‘Concert in the evening.’

“Now for Thursday. ‘At 12 o’clock, visit the hospital. Jews’ meeting in the evening.’

“ ‘Friday, 10 a.m. Club. Afternoon, district visiting.’

“ ‘Saturday, 3 p.m. Mothers’ meeting.’—Why, this mothers’ meeting is something quite new. I thought the vicar’s wife took that.”—“So she does, John; but, poor thing, she is so overworked, that I could not refuse when she asked me to take it for her during the next three months.”

“And is this sort of thing to go on perpetually?” asked the doctor in a despairing voice.

“Why should it not, dearest husband? You would not have your wife a drone in these days, when the world all round us is full of workers?”

“Certainly not; but I very much question if we have not gone mad on this subject of work—at any rate as regards female workers.”

“And would you, then, John, shut up people’s hearts and hands? I thought none knew better than yourself what a vast field there is open for noble effort and service of every kind. Surely you ought to be the last person to discourage us.”

“Nay, my beloved wife, you are not doing me justice,” said the doctor warmly. “What I am convinced of is this—and the conviction gains strength with me every day—that good and loving women like yourself are in grievous peril of marring and curtailing their real usefulness by attempting too much. If agencies for good are to be multiplied, let those who set new ones on foot seek for their workers amongst those who are not already overburdened or fully occupied. I cannot help thinking that there is often much selfishness, or, to use a less harsh word, want of consideration, in those who apply to ladies whose time is already fully and properly occupied, to join them as workers in their pet schemes; for it is easier to try and enlist those who are known to be zealous workers already, than to be at the pains of hunting out new ones. I am sure no one rejoices more than I do in the wonderful and complicated machinery for doing good which exists on all sides in our land and day—I think it one of the most cheering signs and evidences of real progress amongst us; but, for all that, if a person wants to launch a new ship, he should have reasonable grounds for trusting that he shall be able to find hands to man her without borrowing those from a neighbouring vessel, who have kept their watch through stormy winds and waves, and ought, instead of doing extra duty, to be now resting in their hammocks.”

Mrs. Prosser was again silent for a while, and sat looking thoughtfully into the fire. Then, in rather a sorrowful voice, she said, “And what, then, dear John, do you think to be my duty? I can’t help feeling that there is a great deal in what you say. I have not been really satisfied with my own way of going on for some time past. But what would you have me do? What must I give up?”

“I think,” was his reply, “that the thing will settle itself, if you will only begin at the right end.”

“And which is that, dearest?”

“The home end. Let your first and best energies be spent on the home; it will surely be happier for us both. And let the care of your own health, in the way of taking proper exercise, be reckoned as a most important part of home duties. Life is given us to use, and not to shorten. Therefore, don’t undertake anything which will unfit you for the due performance of these home duties. You have no just call to any such undertaking. Do that which is the manifest work lying at your hand, and I feel sure you will be guided aright as to what other work you can find time and strength for.”

“Well, John, I will think it well over; I am glad we have had this conversation.”

“So am I, my precious wife; I am sure good will come of it. And you know we have an invitation to visit the Maltbys in the spring: we shall be sure to get some words of valuable counsel there. I don’t want to hinder you from doing good out of your own home; I don’t want selfishly to claim all your energies for home work, and my own convenience and comfort: but I do feel strongly, and more and more strongly every day, that there is a tendency at the present day to make an idol of woman’s work; to keep, too, the bow perpetually on the stretch; to drag wives, mothers, and daughters from their home duties into public, and to give them no rest, but bid them strain every nerve, and gallop, gallop till they die.”

“Perhaps so, John; but it is time for me to go up and dress for dinner.”