But the day comes sooner or later to the married pair, when the prose pages must be turned, and poetry relegated to the background, days on which the reality of life, in all its grim nakedness, seems to banish romance, and when love needs all its strength and staying power for the fight. The common-sense man or woman, of which type a few examples yet remain with us, will prepare themselves for the slight disappointments which are inevitable, when two people, regarding each other from an adoring distance, and having invested each other with many exaggerated gifts and graces, put themselves voluntarily to the test of everyday life, with all its prosaic details, its crosses and losses, its silences and its tears. It is like making a new acquaintance, having to meet each other in all situations, and in various unromantic and sometimes supremely trying conditions. Edwin pacing his chamber floor anathematising a buttonless shirt is a picture our comic journals have made familiar to us; and Angelina in her curl-papers and untidy morning gown looks a different being from the sylph in evening attire all smiles and blushes. These extreme examples serve only to illustrate my contention, that the closeness of the marriage relation carries its peril with it. To the man or woman, however, who marries for that love which is based on the qualities of both head and heart, and who knows that daily life, with its rubs and scrubs, will sometimes mar the sweetest temper and cloud the serenest brow, there cannot come any serious disillusionment. Loving each other dearly, they remember they are but human; and as perfection is not inborn in humanity, they accept each other's faults and shortcomings gracefully, not magnifying them sourly and grumblingly, but bearing with them, and rejoicing in and accepting the good. Domestic life to the young and untried housekeeper is something of an ordeal. She may have had her own place in her father's home, her own special duties to attend to, even her own share of responsibility. Still, it is an altogether different matter to have the entire care of a household, to guide all its concerns, and be responsible for the domestic comfort of all within the four walls of the house. Happy the young wife who had a wise mother, and came well-equipped from the parental home.