hild-wife!"
When I am very disappointing, say, "I knew, a long time ago, that she
would make but a child-wife!" When you miss what I should like to be,
and I think can never be, say, "still my foolish child-wife loves me!"
For indeed I do.'

I had not been serious with her; having no idea until now, that she was
serious herself. But her affectionate nature was so happy in what I now
said to her with my whole heart, that her face became a laughing one
before her glittering eyes were dry. She was soon my child-wife indeed;
sitting down on the floor outside the Chinese House, ringing all
the little bells one after another, to punish Jip for his recent bad
behaviour; while Jip lay blinking in the doorway with his head out, even
too lazy to be teased.

This appeal of Dora's made a strong impression on me. I look back on the
time I write of; I invoke the innocent figure that I dearly loved, to
come out from the mists and shadows of the past, and turn its gentle
head towards me once again; and I can still declare that this one little
speech was constantly in my memory. I may not have used it to the best
account; I was young and inexperienced; but I never turned a deaf ear to
its artless pleading.

Dora told me, shortly afterwards, that she was going to be a wonderful
housekeeper. Accordingly, she polished the tablets, pointed the pencil,
bought an immense account-book, carefully stitched up with a needle and
thread all the leaves of the Cookery Book which Jip had torn, and made
quite a desperate little attempt 'to be good', as she called it. But the
figures had the old obstinate propensity--they WOULD NOT add up. When
she had entered two or three laborious items in the account-book, Jip
would walk over the page, wagging his tail, and smear them all out. Her
own little right-hand middle finger got steeped to the very bone in ink;
and I think that was the only decided result obtained.

Sometimes, of an evening, when I was at home and at work--for I wrote
a good deal now, and was beginning in a small way to be known as a
writer--I would lay down my pen, and watch my child-wife trying to be
good. First of all, she would bring out the immense account-book, and
lay it down upon the table, with a deep sigh. Then she would open it at
the place where Jip had made it illegible last night, and call Jip
up, to look at his misdeeds. This would occasion a diversion in Jip's
favour, and some inking of his nose, perhaps, as a penalty. The