that you
have got my arm you shall keep it--I say it is such an inconvenient and
ridiculous mode of locomotion that if you were any one else I should
prefer to wheel you home in a barrow. Our present mode of proceeding
would be inexcusable if I were a traction-engine, and you my tender."

"Then let me go. What will the people think if they see a great engineer
violating the laws of mechanics by dragging his wife by the arm?"

"They will appreciate my motives; and, in fact, if you watch them, you
will detect a thinly-disguised envy in their countenances. I violate the
laws of mechanics--to use your own sarcastic phrase--for many reasons. I
like to be envied when there are solid reasons for it. It gratifies my
vanity to be seen in this artistic quarter with a pretty woman on my
arm. Again, the sense of possessing you is no longer an abstraction when
I hold you bodily, and feel the impossibility of keeping step with you.
Besides, Man, who was a savage only yesterday, has his infirmities, and
finds a poetic pleasure in the touch of the woman he loves. And I may
add that you have been in such a bad temper all the afternoon that I
suspect you of an itching to box my ears, and therefore feel safer with
your arm in my custody."

"Oh! _Indeed_ I have not been in a bad temper. I have been most anxious
to spend a happy day."

"And I have been placidly reflective, and not anxious at all. Is that
what has provoked you?"

"I am not provoked. But you might tell me what your reflections are
about."

"They would fill volumes, if I could recollect them."

"You must recollect some of them. From the time we left the station
until a moment ago, when we began to talk, you were pondering something
with the deepest seriousness. What was it?"

"I forget."

"Of course you forget--just because I want to know. What a crowded road
this is!" She disengaged herself from his arm; and this time he did not
resist her.

"That reminds me of it. The crowd consists partly of people going to the
pro-Cathedral. The pro-Cathedral contains an altar. An altar suggests
kneeling on hard stone; and that brings me to the disease called
'housemaids' knee,' which was the subject of my reflections."

"A pleasant subject for a fine Sunday! Thank you. I dont want to hear
any more."

"But you will hear more of it; for I am going to have the steps of our
house taken away and replaced by marble, or slate, or something that can
be cleaned with a mop and a pai