ecause they are really above them."

"But in what respect?"

"They are better and more esteemed in society."

"As to their being better, that is only an assumption. But I see I
must bring the matter right home. Would you be really any worse,
were your father a mechanic?"

"The question is not a fair one. You suppose an impossible case."

"Not so impossible as you might imagine. You are the daughter of a
mechanic."

"Brother, why will you talk so? I am out of all patience with you!"
said Mrs. Ludlow, angrily.

"And yet, no one knows better than you, that I speak only the truth.
No one knows better than you, that Mr. Ludlow served many years at
the trade of a shoemaker. And that, consequently, these high-minded
young ladies, who sneer at mechanics, are themselves a shoemaker's
daughters--a fact that is just as well known abroad as anything else
relating to the family. And now, Misses Emily and Adeline, I hope
you will hereafter find it in your hearts to be a little more
tolerant of mechanics daughters."

And thus saying, Uncle Joseph rose, and bidding them good night,
left them to their own reflections, which were not of the most
pleasant character, especially as the mother could not deny the
allegation he had made.

During the next summer, Mr. Ludlow, whose business was no longer
embarrassed, and who had become satisfied that, although he should
sink a large proportion of a handsome fortune, he would still have a
competence left, and that well secured--proposed to visit Saratoga,
as usual. There was not a dissenting voice--no objecting on the
score of meeting vulgar people there. The painful fact disclosed by
Uncle Joseph, of their plebeian origin, and the marriage of Mr.
Armand--whose station in society was not to be questioned--with Mary
Jones, the watchmaker's daughter, had softened and subdued their
tone of feeling, and caused them to set up a new standard of
estimation. The old one would not do, for, judged by that, they
would have to hide their diminished heads. Their conduct at the
Springs was far less objectionable than it had been heretofore,
partaking of the modest and retiring in deportment, rather than the
assuming, the arrogant, and the self-sufficient. Mrs. Armand was
there, with her sister, moving in the first circles; and Emily
Ludlow and her sister Adeline felt honored rather than humiliated by
an association with them. It is to be hoped they will yet make
sensible women.

THE WIFE.