We would insist upon this peculiarity of the every-day married lady--that her existence is collective. Her very language is in the plural number--such as we, ours, and us. She respects the rights of paternity so much, as never to permit herself to talk of her children as peculiarly her own. Her individuality being merged in her husband and their actual or possible offspring, she has no private thoughts, no wishes, no hopes, no fears but for the concern. And this is all the better for her tranquillity: for although a part of her husband, she does not quite fancy that he is a part of her. She leaves at least the business to his management, and if she does advise and suggest on occasions, she thinks that somehow things will come out very well. She feels that she is only a passenger; and although, as such, she may recommend the skipper to shorten sail when weathering a critical point, or, for the sake of safety, to come to anchor in the middle of the sea, she has still a certain faith in his skill or luck, and sleeps quietly in the storm. For this reason the every day married lady is comfortable in the figure, and has usually good round features of her own. The Miss Smith she has survived had a slender waist and small delicate hands; but this lady is a very tolerable armful, and the wedding-ring makes such a hollow on her finger, that one might think it would be difficult to get off. The every-day married lady is commonly reported to be selfish; but this is a mistake. At least her selfishness embraces the whole family circle: it has no personality. When the wife of a poor man, she will sit up half the night sewing and darning, but not a stitch for herself: that can be done at any time; but the boys must go comfortably to school, and the girls look genteel on the street, and the husband--to think of Mr. Brown wanting a button on his shirt! She looks selfish, because her eye is always on her own, and because she talks of what she is always thinking about; but how can one be selfish who is perpetually postponing herself, who dresses the plainest, eats the coarsest, and sleeps the least of the family? She never puts herself forward in company unless her young ladies want backing; but yet she never feels herself overlooked, for every word, every glance bestowed upon them, is communicated electrically to her. She is, indeed, in such perfect _rapport_ with the concern, that it is no uncommon thing for her to go home chuckling with amusement, overpowered with delight, from a party at which she had not once opened her lips. This is the party which she pronounces to have "gone off" well. Half-observant people fancy that the calculation is made on the score of the jellies and ice, and singing and dancing, and so on, and influenced by a secret comparison with her own achievements; but she has more depth than they imagine, and finer sympathies--they don't understand her.