ure?" The bride who can emerge triumphantly from this
searching ordeal will hold her own for the rest of her career as a
wife. The newly-married girl or woman has everything to try her
mettle. The end of the honeymoon sees the beginning of her real work.
She has won her husband; she has charmed and satisfied him in the
hours of love in idleness; she has now to keep him true to his
allegiance through the dull prosaic days of ordinary, humdrum life.
For the husband the change is not nearly so great. He has his usual
daily avocations to follow; his business or professional duties have
undergone no alteration.

We will hope the wedded pair have a nice cosy home awaiting their
return. If the honeymoon has been short, the bulk of the preparations
will have been made before the wedding, and a mother or sister will
have put the finishing touches during the bride's absence, but no one
should be awaiting them in their new home except the servants they
have engaged. It may be that there is a visit to be paid to relations
before settling into the new home, and this will be a little trying.
Those who love them and who watch them start on their wedding journey
will eagerly scan their features for some sign to indicate how things
have gone with them in this important interval. A happy heart need
shun {98} no such scrutiny, but where the slightest wound is hidden
under smiles the loving solicitude will give pain.

A Plunge into the Practical.

Whatever the nature of the new home may be, whether mansion or
cottage, town flat or suburban villa, even if it be but the temporary
resting-place of furnished rooms, the wife will do well to begin by
studying her husband's comfort, and finding out any special likes and
dislikes that may not as yet have come under her notice. He, for his
part, must not expect too much, and should try not to make her
painfully conscious of her shortcomings. He might also reflect with
advantage, when things are not to his taste, that he has himself to
thank for a good deal. He chose his wife for her youth, her beauty,
her charm, or her money it may be, and he then asked for no other
qualification. He took up all her thoughts and her spare time during
their engagement, and all he asked was that she should look nice and
let him make love to her. She was purely ornamental in those days, and
he was content to have her so. Once marriage is over he expects her to
develop exactly those domestic gifts that shall best