ny Sophonisba Brown, sir, who
has left my bed and board without provocation, sir,--_vide_ the
Providence papers, sir,--left me, sir, because I didn't approve of her
strong-minded goings on, sir, her woman's-rights meetings, sir, and
her nigger colonizations, sir, and her--but that's enough, sir."

Here Miss Sumker, who was a mild, freckled-faced girl, dropped the arm
of her companion, and meekly sat down on a doorstep, and covered her
face with a handkerchief.

"Mr. Brown, sir!" cried our poor young friend, finally plucking up a
spirit.

"Go it, lemons!" shouted a listening drayman, as he hung over the
scene from one of his cart stakes.

"Captain Brown," suggested the furious man, with smothered rage.

"Well then, _Captain_ Brown," said Brown, 2d., spitefully, "the lady
you allude to is a total stranger to me. She was put under my care by
a benevolent-looking old gentleman, with gold-bowed spectacles, and
she has already cost me ten dollars, money advanced on her account."

"All persons are forbidden to trust the same, as I will pay no debts
of her contracting," said the furious man, with gleams of unmitigated
ferocity and savage exultation.

"Then I'm done brown, that's all," said the young man, gloomily. "As
for Mrs. Fanny Sophonisba Brown, I never want to see her face again.
She is at the American House, and you can recover her by proving
property and paying charges. And, for my part, I hope I may be kicked
to death by grasshoppers if ever I take charge of a lady again."

This was the largest speech, probably, that the sandy-haired young man
had ever made in his life. It was a regular "stunner," though. It
convinced Miss Sumker, who had for a moment thought of withdrawing the
light of her freckles from him forever, and who now hastened to
replace her arm in his; and it convinced Captain Brown, who became
suddenly as mild as moonbeams, shook his new acquaintance by the hand,
and declared him a "fine young fellow."

But the drayman was disgusted at the affair ending without a fight,
and expressed his feelings, as he laid the lash across his horse, by
the single exclamation, "Pickles!" thereby insinuating that the
nauseous sweetness of the reconciliation required a strong dash of
acidity to neutralize its flavor.

The captain regained his strong-minded wife, and our sandy-haired
friend went home with Miss Sumker, metamorphosed into Mrs. Brown,
having "taken charge" of her for life.

THE NEW YEAR'S BE