| | | Publishers and Proprietors, | | | | 434 Broome Street, New York. | | | +--------------------------------------------------------------+ Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1870, by the PUNCHINELLO PUBLISHING COMPANY, in the Office of the Librarian of Congress at Washington. * * * * * MAN AND WIVES. A TRAVESTY. By MOSE SKINNER. CHAPTER FOURTH. THE HALF-WAY HOUSE The first person to discover that ANN BRUMMET had left the house, was Mrs. LADLE, Now, ever since the Hon. MICHAEL had asked ANN to go to the circus, Mrs. LADLE had hated her. But when he took ANN to the Agricultural Fair, and bought her a tin-type album and a box of initial note-paper, Mrs. LADLE was simply raving. Whether she herself was viewing the Hon. MICHAEL with an eye matrimonial, and was jealous of ANN, must remain an open question. At any rate, she was the first to start the scandal about ANN and JEFFRY, and lost no time in conveying it to the ears of the Hon. MICHAEL, with profuse embellishments. At the croquet party the Hon. MICHAEL had been particularly sweet on ANN, his ardor finding vent in such demonstrations as throwing kisses at her slyly, holding up printed lozenges for her inspection, or tossing sticks at her and dodging behind a tree. And when Mrs. LADLE went to ANN'S room next day, for a good square scold, she found her out. Now Mrs. LADLE was a mother-in-law, and consequently a pretty old fowl in ferreting out things of this sort. She determined to discover the why and wherefore of ANN'S departure. If she could confront the Hon. MICHAEL with proofs of ANN'S indiscretion, it would be the loudest kind of feather in her cap. She examined everybody in the house, and everybody that went by the house, but without the smallest result. She was out in the front yard waiting for a fresh victim, when she saw HERSEY DEATHBURY coming up the road. She signed to her to come in. She came in.