Notwithstanding the love that made Edward Armstrong gentle and indulgent to his wife, there yet existed certain phases in his character which jarred upon her love of refinement, and caused her great annoyance. His eccentricities, his prejudices, and, at times when angry, a certain coarseness of manner, were actual pain to his sensitive wife. But she possessed a natural sweetness of temper that could "turn away wrath" by a "soft answer" or silence. She had quickly discovered that his will was law, and brooked no contradiction; and her love of peace as well as her wifely love very soon taught her to give way to her husband in every point.
Besides, she had all the comforts and luxuries of a refined home, equal in many respects to the homes of her sisters, although considered so inferior in position; a loving and indulgent husband, and four children, of whom Mary was the eldest and only girl.
Her relatives had not cast her off because of her marriage; the occasion of their first meeting, when Edward Armstrong had been the means of saving their sister's life, rendered such an idea impossible. Added to this, Maria's husband was unmistakably a man of intellectual tastes as well as education, notwithstanding his eccentricities and peculiar notions. Association with his wife, and mixing in the society he sometimes met with at the houses of her sisters, had already increased his refinement of manner, although nothing could as yet entirely overcome the effects of narrow minded prejudices.
The custom now so prevalent which enables a man of business to take a house for his wife and children at a distance from London, was at the time of which we write a novelty. Railways and omnibuses, by which London is now filled in the morning and deserted in the evening, were in a state of progression. Yet Mr. Armstrong could not be persuaded to take a house out of town; it was a new-fangled notion, he would say, and quite out of place in a man of business. Mrs. Armstrong's family, therefore, could only get over the fact of her living above a shop with her children by ascribing it to her husband's eccentricities.
"My brother-in-law keeps horses, and he could easily ride or drive into town every day if he chose, but we cannot persuade him to do so," said Mrs. Herbert to a visitor on one occasion; "but I hope he will give way at last, especially when his daughter is old enough to be introduced into society."
But if all these little matters troubled Mrs. Armstrong's family, her husband felt himself also aggrieved on one point in which she was the unfortunate cause.
He had quickly discovered after his marriage that his loving and accomplished wife was totally ignorant of domestic duties or of the management of a household.
She soon also became conscious of her deficiencies, and tried to acquire the necessary knowledge by every effort in her power, but in vain; and her husband, accustomed to the perfect order and regularity of his mother's house, never appeared satisfied.
This circumstance produced after a time, as their family increased, new plans on the part of Mr. Armstrong. He engaged a suitable housekeeper, to regulate the domestic arrangements of his home, and placed the education of Mary in the hands of her mother, knowing well that no one could be found more fit for that office.
Gladly Mrs. Armstrong gave up the duties she felt so irksome, and divided her time between the nursery and the schoolroom. In this way, notwithstanding the fact that her drawing-room and dining-room were on the floor above her husband's business, and in spite also of various annoyances which his eccentric doings in the household often caused, the years passed away in comfort and happiness, bringing the time in which this chapter commences.