to take the place of
religion, and was to gather into the new home all the cords which would
have a tendency to draw the young man in a different direction. And
neighbours and friends said, "Young people would be young people;" that
Kate would turn any man into a good husband; and that she would be near
at hand to look in upon her old father and mother. So the attachment
duly ripened without further check; and before she was one and twenty,
Kate Evans was married to William Foster at the registrar's office.

And now, on this December evening, rather more than a year had gone by
since the wedding-day. And what of the _love_ which was to have
effected such great things? Alas! the gilding had got sadly rubbed off.
Not many weeks after the marriage a cloud began to gather on the face
of both husband and wife.

Coming home some day at dinner-time he would find no table laid out, the
meat half raw, and the potatoes the same; while an open book of poetry
or science, turned face downwards on the sloppy dresser, showed how his
wife had been spending the time which ought to have been occupied in
preparing her husband's meal. Then, again, when work was over, he would
find, on his return home, his wife, with uncombed hair and flushed
cheeks, on her knees, puffing away at a few sparks in the cheerless
grate, while the kettle rested sulkily on a cliff of black coal, and
looked as if boiling was on its part a very remote possibility indeed.

Not that Kate was a gadder about or a gossip, but she was sleeveless,
dawdling, and dreamy, and always behindhand. Everything was out of its
place. Thus Foster would take up a spill-case, expecting to find
material wherewith to light his evening pipe; but instead of spills, it
was full of greasy hair-pins. And when, annoyed and disgusted, he tore
a fly-leaf out of one of his wife's school prizes, declaring that, if
she did not provide him with spills, he would take them where he could
get them, a storm of passionate reproaches was followed by a volley of
curses on his part, and a hasty and indignant retreat to the public-
house parlour.

And then, again, his late hours at the club, or the unwelcome presence
of his sceptical companions, whom he would sometimes bring home to
discuss their opinions over pipes and spirits, would be the ground of
strong and angry remonstrance. And the breach began soon to widen.

Washing-day would come round with all its discomforts, which she had not
lea