"Very odd dinner don't come," said she, consulting the kitchen clock; "it is high time that beef was on, roasting." It _was_ odd--and odder still that Skiddy had not appeared to tell her _why_ the dinner didn't come. Mrs. Skiddy wasted no time in words about it. No; she seized her bonnet, and went immediately to Fogg & Co., to get some tidings of him; they were apparently quite as much at a loss as herself to account for Skiddy's non-appearance. She was just departing, when one of the sub-clerks, whom the unfortunate Skiddy had once snubbed, whispered a word in her ear, the effect of which was instantaneous. Did she let the grass grow under her feet till she tracked Skiddy to "the wharf," and boarded the "Sea-Gull," bound for California, and brought the crestfallen man triumphantly back to his domicil, amid convulsions of laughter from the amused captain and his crew? No. "There, now," said his amiable spouse, untying her bonnet, "there's _another_ flash in the pan, Skiddy. Anybody who thinks to circumvent Matilda Maria Skiddy, must get up early in the morning, and find themselves too late at that. Now hold this child," dumping the doomed baby into his lap, "while I comb my hair. Goodness knows you weren't worth bringing back; but when I set out to have my own way, Mr. Skiddy, Mount Vesuvius shan't stop me." Skiddy tended the baby without a remonstrance; he perfectly understood, that for a probationary time he should be put "on the limits," the street-door being the boundary line. He heaved no sigh when his coat and hat, with the rest of his wearing apparel, were locked up, and the key buried in the depths of his wife's pocket. He played with Tommy, and made card-houses for Sammy and Johnny, wound several tangled skeins of silk for "Maria Matilda," mended a broken button on the closet door, replaced a missing knob on one of the bureau drawers, and appeared to be in as resigned and proper a frame of mind as such a perfidious wretch could be expected to be in. Two or three weeks passed in this state of incarceration, during which the errand-boy of Fogg & Co. had been repeatedly informed by Mrs. Skiddy, that the doctor hoped Mr. Skiddy would soon be sufficiently convalescent to attend to business. As to Skiddy, he continued at intervals to shed crocodile tears over his past short-comings, or rather his short-_goings_! In consequence of this apparently submissive frame of mind, he, one fine morning, received total absolution from Mrs. Skiddy, and leave to go to the store; which Skiddy peremptorily declined, desiring, as he said, to test the sincerity of his repentance by a still longer period of probation. "Don't be a fool, Skiddy," said Maria Matilda, pointing to the Daguerreotype case, and then crowding his beaver down over his eyes; "don't be a fool. Make a B line for the store, now, and tell Fogg you've had an attack of _room-a-tism_;" and Maria Matilda laughed at her wretched pun.