Like a wise and good man he leaves the question of his household entirely to the woman. They like going to the play. They like going to Greenwich. They like coming to a party at bachelor’s hall. They are up to all sorts of fun, in a word; in which taste the good-natured Newboy acquiesces, provided he is left to follow his own. It was only on the 17th of the month that, having had the honour to dine at the house, when, after dinner, which took place at eight, we left Newboy to his blue books, and went up stairs and sang a little to the guitar afterwards--it was only on the 17th December, the night of Lady Sowerby’s party, that the following dialogue took place in the boudoir, whither Newboy, blue books in hand, had ascended. He was curled up with his House of Commons boots on his wife’s arm-chair, reading his eternal blue books, when Mrs. N. entered from her apartment, dressed for the evening. [Illustration: THE STREET DOOR KEY.] _Mrs. N._--Frederic, wont you come? _Mr. N._--Where? _Mrs. N._--To Lady Sowerby’s. _Mr. N._--I’d rather go to the black hole in Calcutta. Besides, this Sanitary Report is really the most interesting--[_he begins to read._] _Mrs. N._ (_piqued_)--Well; Mr. Titmarsh will go with us. _Mr. N._--Will he? I wish him joy! At this puncture Miss Clarissa Newboy enters in a pink paletôt, trimmed with swansdown--looking like an angel--and we exchange glances of--what shall I say?--of sympathy on both parts, and consummate rapture on mine. But this is by-play. _Mrs. N._--Good night, Frederic. I think we shall be late. _Mr. N._--You won’t wake me, I daresay; and you don’t expect a public man to sit up. _Mrs. N._--It’s not you, it’s the servants. Cocker sleeps very heavily. The maids are best in bed, and are all ill with the influenza. I say, Frederic dear, don’t you think you had better give me YOUR CHUBB KEY? This astonishing proposal, which violates every recognised law of society--this demand which alters all the existing state of things--this fact of a woman asking for a door-key, struck me with a terror which I cannot describe, and impressed me with the fact of the vast progress of Our Street. The door-key! What would our grandmother, who dwelt in this place when it was a rustic suburb, think of its condition now, when husbands stay at home, and wives go abroad with the latch-key? The evening at Lady Sowerby’s was the most delicious we have spent for long, long days.