my knee, to coax me to be quiet, and
drew a line with her pencil down the middle of my nose; but I couldn't
dine off that, though it was very agreeable.

"Don't you think, my dear, it would be better for you to remonstrate
with Mary Anne?"

"O no, please! I couldn't, Doady!"

"Why not, my love?"

"O, because I am such a little goose, and she knows I am!"

I thought this sentiment so incompatible with the establishment of any
system of check on Mary Anne, that I frowned a little.

"My precious wife, we must be serious some times. Come! sit down on this
chair, close beside me! Give me the pencil! There! Now let us talk
sensibly. You know, dear," what a little hand it was to hold, and what a
tiny wedding ring it was to see,--"you know, my love, it is not exactly
comfortable to have to go out without one's dinner. Now, is it?"

"N-n-no!"

"My love, how you tremble!"

"Because, I know you're going to scold me."

"My sweet, I am only going to reason."

"O, but reasoning is worse than scolding! I didn't marry to be reasoned
with. If you meant to reason with such a poor little thing as I am, you
ought to have told me so, you cruel boy!"

"Dora, my darling!"

"No, I am not your darling. Because you must be sorry that you married
me, or else you wouldn't reason with me!"

I felt so injured by the inconsequential nature of this charge, that it
gave me courage to be grave.

"Now, my own Dora, you are childish, and are talking nonsense. You must
remember, I am sure, that I was obliged to go out yesterday when dinner
was half over; and that, the day before, I was made quite unwell by
being obliged to eat underdone veal in a hurry; to-day, I don't dine at
all, and I am afraid to say how long we waited for breakfast, and then
the water didn't boil. I don't mean to reproach you, my dear, but this,
is not comfortable."

"Oh, you cruel, cruel boy, to say I am a disagreeable wife!"

"Now, my dear Dora, you must know that I never said that!"

"You said I wasn't comfortable!"

"I said the housekeeping was not comfortable!"

"It's exactly the same thing! and I wonder, I do, at your making such
ungrateful speeches. When you know that the other day, when you said you
would like a little bit of fish, I went out myself, miles and miles, and
ordered it to surprise you."

"And it was very kind of you, my own darling; and I felt it so much that
I wouldn't on any account have mentioned that you bought a salmon, which
was