SAILING UP STREAM.
[The following is quoted, by permission, from Mr. Habberton's popular book, "THE BARTON EXPERIMENT," published by G.P. PUTNAM'S SONS, New York.]
The superintendency of the Mississippi Valley Woolen Mills was a position which exactly suited Fred Macdonald, and it gave him occasion for the expenditure of whatever superfluous energy he found himself possessed of, yet it did not engross his entire attention. The faculty which the busiest of young men have for finding time in which to present themselves, well clothed and unbusiness-like, to at least one young woman, is as remarkable and admirable as it is inexplicable. The evenings which did not find Fred in Parson Wedgewell's parlor were few indeed, and if, when he was with Esther, he did not talk quite as sentimentally as he had done in the earlier days of his engagement, and if he talked business very frequently, the change did not seem distasteful to the lady herself. For the business of which he talked was, in the main, a sort which loving women have for ages recognized as the inevitable, and to which they have subjected themselves with a unanimity which deserves the gratitude of all humanity. Fred talked of a cottage which he might enter without first knocking at the door, and of a partnership which should be unlimited; if he learned, in the course of successive conversations, that even in partnerships of the most extreme order many compromises are absolutely necessary, the lesson was one which improved his character in the ratio in which it abased his pride. The cottage grew as rapidly as the mill, and on his returns from various trips for machinery there came with Fred's freight certain packages which prevented their owner from appearing so completely the absorbed businessman which he flattered himself that he seemed. Then the partnership was formed one evening in Parson Wedgewell's own church, in the presence of a host of witnesses, Fred appearing as self-satisfied and radiant as the gainer in such transactions always does, while Esther's noble face and drooping eyes showed beyond doubt who it was that was the giver.
As the weeks succeeded each other after the wedding, however, no acquaintance of the couple could wonder whether the gainer or the giver was the happier. Fred improved rapidly, as the schoolboy improves; but Esther's graces were already of mature growth, and rejoiced in their opportunity for development. Though she could not have explained how it happened, she could not but notice that maidens regarded her wonderingly, wives contemplated her wistfully, frowns departed and smiles appeared when she approached people who were usually considered prosaic. Yet shadows sometimes stole over her face, when she looked at certain of her old acquaintances, and the cause thereof soon took a development which was anything but pleasing to her husband.
"Fred," said Esther one evening, "it makes me real unhappy sometimes to think of the good wives there are who are not as happy as I am. I think of Mrs. Moshier and Mrs. Crayme, and the only reason that I can see is, their husbands drink."
"I guess you're right, Ettie," said Fred. "They didn't begin their domestic tyranny in advance, as you did—bless you for it."
"But why don't their husbands stop?" asked Esther, too deeply interested in her subject to notice her husband's compliment. "They must see what they're doing, and how cruel it all is."
"They're too far gone to stop; I suppose that's the reason," said Fred. "It hasn't been easy work for me to keep my promise, Ettie, and I'm a young man; Moshier and Crayme are middle-aged men, and liquor is simply necessary to them."
"That dreadful old Bunley wasn't too old to reform, it seems," said Esther. "Fred, I believe one reason is that no one has asked them to stop. See how good Harry Wainwright has been since he found that so many people were interested in him that day!"