A GENTLE HINT.
In most of the New York shop windows, one reads: “Here we speak French;” “Here we speak Spanish;” “Here we speak German;” “Here we speak Italian.” I suggest an improvement—“Here we speak the Truth.”
A STORY FOR OLD HUSBANDS WITH YOUNG WIVES.
“I was an old fool! Yes—I was an old fool; that’s all there is about it. I ought to have known better; she was not to blame, poor thing; she is but a child yet; and these baubles pleased her ambitious mother’s eye. It was not the old man, but his money—his money—I might have known it. May and December—May and December—pshaw! how could I ever have believed, that Mary Terry could love an old fellow like me?” and Mark Ware surveyed himself in the large parlor mirror.
“See!—it reflects a portly old man of sixty, with ruddy face, snow-white hair, and eyes from which the light of youth has long since departed.” And yet there is fire in the old man’s veins too; see how he strides across the carpet, ejaculating, with fresh emphasis, “Yes, I was an old fool!—an old fool! But I will be kind to her; I’m not the man to tyrannize over a young girl, because her mother took her out of the nursery to make her my wife. I see now it is not in reason for a young girl like her to stay contentedly at home with my frosty head and gouty feet. Poor little Mary! No—I’ll not punish her because she can not love me; she shall have what she wants, and go where she likes; her mother is only too proud to trot her out, as the wife of the rich Mark Ware. If that will make them both happy, let them do it; may be”—and Mark Ware paused—“may be, after she has seen what that Dead Sea apple—the world—is made of, she will come back and love the old man a little—may be—who knows? No woman who is believed in, and well treated, ever makes a bad wife; there never was a bad wife yet, but there was a bad husband first; that’s gospel—Mark’s gospel, anyhow, and Mark Ware is going to act upon it. Mary shall go to the ball to-night, with her mother, and I will stay at home and nurse my patience and my gouty leg. There’s no evil in her; she’s as pure as a lily, and if she wants to see the world, why—she shall see it; and though I can’t go dancing round with her, I never will dim her bright eyes—no—no!”
“That will do, Tiffy; another pin in this lace; now move that rose in my hair a little to the left; so—that will do.”