chat,"
With her eternal "_frame_,"
Though I should speak of fifty things,
She'd answer me the same:
'Tis, "Yes, love--five reds, then a black--
(I quite agree with you)--
I've done this wrong--seven, eight, nine, ten,
An orange--then a blue!"

"If any lady comes to tea,
Her bag is first surveyed;
And if the pattern pleases her,
A copy then is made;
She stares the men quite out of face,
And when I ask her why,
'Tis, "Oh, my love, the pattern of
His waistcoat struck my eye!"

"And if to walk I am inclined
(It's seldom I go out),
At every worsted-shop she sees,
Oh, how she looks about!
And says, "Bless me! I _must_ 'go in,
The pattern is so rare;
That group of flowers is just the thing
I wanted for my chair!"

"Besides, the things she makes are all
Such "Touch-me-not" affairs,
I dare not even use a stool,
Nor screen; and as for chairs,
'Twas only yesterday I put
My youngest boy in one,
And until then I never knew
My wife had such a tongue!

"Alas, for my poor little ones!
They dare not move nor speak,
It's "Tom, be still, put down that bag,
Why, Harriet, where's your feet!
Maria, standing on that stool!!
It wasn't made for use;
Be silent all: three greens, one red,
A blue, and then a puce!"

"Oh, Heaven preserve me from a wife
With "fancy-work" run wild;
And hands which never do aught else
For husband or for child:
Our clothes are rent, our bills unpaid,
Our house is in disorder,
_And all because my lady-wife_
_Has taken to embroider_!"

-------------------------------------

Private subscriptions to a book, "for the benefit of the author," is one
way of paying creditors by taxing your friends. There have been some
curious specimens of this kind of "raising the wind," in this same big
metropolis of Gotham, which have proved what is called at the West "a
caution;" a caution which the victims found, to their mortification, that
they needed beforehand. "All honor to the sex," we say, of course, but not
the _same_ honor to _all_ of the sex; for there have been instances,
hereabout, of inveterate feminine book-purveyors, who have reflected
little honor upon themselves, and less upon "the sex;" as certain public
functionaries could bear witness--in fac