“I know him well, your excellency,” was the reply; “and a more selfish man does not exist. He tells the truth, however, when he says that he is entirely dependent on his wife for his happiness; but it was impossible for her to accompany him hither, as she is the most unselfish of women. On her he has ever made it a practice to vent his chief spleen and bitterness, exacting from her at the same time perpetual service, and rarely repaying her with anything but sneers and insults, holding her up even to the scorn and ridicule of his acquaintance.”
As the secretary uttered these words, a burning blush covered the face of the unhappy man, who ceased his sighs and bent his head upon his hands.
“My friend,” said the commissioner gently, “I am truly sorry for you; but I am in hopes that your solitude will work for your good. Think over the past with contrition, and be up and joining in some useful work for the good of others; and when you return home, treat your injured, long-suffering, and admirable wife as a human being, a lady, a companion, a friend, an equal, and not, as you have hitherto done, like a slave or a brute beast.”
There was no reply, and the commissioner hastened to the shore. He was about to step into the boat that was to convey him to the steamer, when a young man of dandified appearance and affected manner requested to know whether he could have one moment’s private interview with the commissioner before his departure.
“Well, sir,” said the other, somewhat impatiently, “you must be brief, for I am anxious to lose no time, as business matters at home are pressing.”
“Sir,” said the young man, dropping, at the same time, his affected drawl, “my case is a hard one, and I would ask if you could not grant me a passage home in the vessel by which you are returning.”
“On what grounds?” asked the commissioner.
“Why, sir, I have an old mother and a sister, both in infirm health, who can hardly get on without me; and it is only just that I should be allowed to return, as my mother, who is a widow, has no other son.”
“Do you know this young man?” inquired the commissioner, turning to his secretary.
“Far too well, your excellency; he is the clog of his home, the laughing-stock of his companions behind his back, and is despised by all wise and sensible people. He has had situation after situation offered him, in which he could have earned an honest and respectable livelihood, but he has declined one after another as not to his taste. He is far too much of a gentleman, in his own estimation, to enter upon any work that will involve any steady exertion; but he does not scruple to sponge upon his poor mother, to whose support he contributes nothing, and who has barely enough to meet her own needs, while he borrows—that is, appropriates—the savings of his delicate sister, who, though in feeble health, has undertaken tuition, because this brother of hers is too fine a gentleman to live in anything but idleness, and spends those hard-earned savings of hers as pocket-money on his own elegant pleasures and follies.”