Home Scenes and Home Influence; a series of tales and sketchesArthur, T. S. (Timothy Shay)
General
Home Scenes and Home Influence; a series of tales and sketches
Arthur, T. S. (Timothy Shay)
Didactic fiction; Domestic fiction; Family life -- Fiction; Marriage -- Fiction
"Well, anyhow," said I, rallying myself, and speaking with some
lightness of tone, "it is clear that Mrs. Tudor is no lady, for all
you thought her such a pattern-card of gentility."
"And I have not the least doubt," retorted my wife, "that it is
equally clear to Mr. Tudor that you are no gentleman. So, on that
score, the account stands fairly balanced between the two families."
This was a pretty hard hit; and I felt a little "riled up," as the
Yankees say, but I concluded that the uttering of a few sharp
sayings to my wife, under the circumstances, would not prove my
claim to being a gentleman, especially against the facts of the
case; so I cooled down, and walked home rather silently, and in not
the best humour with myself.
On the next morning, I took up a little book from my wife's bureau,
and sat down to look over it while waiting for the breakfast bell.
It was a book of aphorisms, and I opened at once to a page where a
leaf was turned down. A slight dot with a pencil directed my eyes to
a particular line, which read--
"_He who lives in a glass house shouldn't throw stones_."
I am not sure that Mrs. Sunderland turned down that leaf in the
book, and marked the sentiment for my especial benefit; though I
strongly suspected her. At any rate, I deemed it best not to ask the
question.
GOING INTO MOURNING.
THE weeping mother bent over the beautiful form of innocent
childhood--beautiful still, though its animating spirit had
fled--and kissed the pale cheek of her dear departed one. When she
lifted her head, a tear glistened on the cold brow of the babe. Then
the father looked his last look, and, with an effort, controlled the
emotion that wellnigh mastered him. The sisters came next, with
audible sobs, and cheeks suffused with tears. A moment or two they
gazed upon the expressionless face of their dear little playfellow,
and then the coffin lid was shut down, while each one present
experienced a momentary feeling of suffocation.
As the funeral procession came out of the door, and the family
passed slowly across the pavement to the carriages, a few gossiping
neighbours--such as, with no particular acquaintance with the
principal members of a household, know all about the internal
management of every dwelling in the square--assembled close by, and
thus discoursed of the events connected with the burying.
"Poor Mrs. Condy," said one, "how can she bear the loss of that
sweet little fellow!"
"Other people have lost children as well as she," remarked a
sour-looking dame. "Rich people, thank heaven! have to feel as well
as we poor folks."
No one seemed disposed to reply to this; and there was a momentary
silence.
"They've got up mourning mighty quick," said a third speaker.
"Little Willie only died yesterday morning."
"It's most all borrowed, I suppose," responded a fourth.
"Hardly," said the other.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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