ipe, followed by a walk in the fresh air,
passed before his eyes as he laced his boots. Whistling cheerfully he
went briskly downstairs.

It was an October morning, but despite the invigorating chill in the air
the kitchen-grate was cold and dull. Herring-bones and a disorderly
collection of dirty cups and platters graced the table. Perplexed and
angry, he looked around for his wife, and then, opening the back-door,
stood gaping with astonishment. The wife of his bosom, who should have
had a bright fire and a good breakfast waiting for him, was sitting on a
box in the sunshine, elbows on knees and puffing laboriously at a
cigarette.

"Susan!" he exclaimed.

Mrs. Porter turned, and, puffing out her lips, blew an immense volume of
smoke. "Halloa!" she said, carelessly.

"Wot--wot does this mean?" demanded her husband.

Mrs. Porter smiled with conscious pride. "I made it come out of my nose
just now," she replied. "At least, some of it did, and I swallowed the
rest. Will it hurt me?"

"Where's my breakfast?" inquired the other, hotly. "Why ain't the
kitchen-fire alight? Wot do you think you're doing of?"

"I'm not doing anything," said his wife, with an aggrieved air. "I'm on
strike."

Mr. Porter reeled against the door-post. "Wot!" he stammered. "On
strike? Nonsense! You can't be."

"O, yes, I can," retorted Mrs. Porter, closing one eye and ministering to
it hastily with the corner of her apron. "Not 'aving no Bert Robinson to
do it for me, I made a little speech all to myself, and here I am."

She dropped her apron, replaced the cigarette, and, with her hands on her
plump knees, eyes him steadily.

"But--but this ain't a factory," objected the dismayed man; "and, besides
--I won't 'ave it!"

Mrs. Porter laughed--a fat, comfortable laugh, but with a touch of
hardness in it.

"All right, mate," she said, comfortably. "What are you out on strike
for?"

"Shorter hours and more money," said Mr. Porter, glaring at her.

His wife nodded. "So am I," she said. "I wonder who gets it first?"

She smiled agreeably at the bewildered Mr. Porter, and, extracting a
paper packet of cigarettes from her pocket, lit a fresh one at the stub
of the first.

"That's the worst of a woman," said her husband, avoiding her eye and
addressing a sanitary dustbin of severe aspect; "they do things without
thinking first. That's why men are superior; before they do a thing they
look at it all round, and upside