And she was also such a wife as one reads of in books; no neighbor could charge her with neglecting her duties a hair's breadth in thought, word or deed, all her days, although Pomuchelskopp was in her opinion quite light-minded, because often when joking was going on he would laugh right out loud, which she thought unbecoming in the father of a family, and she feared he would at length ruin his fortunes and bring herself and her children to beggary. She did another thing, which the minister had not inculcated at her betrothal,--she condemned his failings, and gave him daily of her own vinegar to drink and of her sorrel to eat. She tutored him--that is to say when they were alone--as she did her youngest child, her Philipping, and as if Pomuchelskopp still wore his green plaid trousers fastened behind; in short, she drove him just as she pleased. She did not beat him--God forbid! all was with dignity. Merely by her manner of speaking, she knew how to express her opinion of him: if he was unusually frivolous, she called him sharply and shortly by the last syllable of his name, just "Kopp!" ordinarily she called him by the middle syllable, "Muchel," and when he was quite after her own heart, and sat sulkily in the sofa-corner striking at the flies, she called him by the first syllable, and in an affectionate tone, "Pöking." She did not call him "Pöking" to-day. "Kopp!" said she, on account of his light-minded behavior with the children, "Kopp, why do you stand there smoking like a chimney? I think we should call at the Pastor's." "My Klücking," said Pomuchelskopp, reluctantly taking the pipe from his mouth, "we can go. I will put on my dress-coat directly." "Dress-coat! Why so? Do you think I shall dress up in black silk? It is only our Pastor." She emphasized the "our," as if she had spoken of her shepherd, and as if she considered the Pastor merely their hired servant. "Just as you please, my Häuhning," said Pomuchelskopp, "I can put on my brown overcoat. Philipping, let the beating go; Mama doesn't like it." "Kopp! let the children alone, attend to yourself. You can keep on your nankeen coat, it is clean and good." "My Klücking," said Pomuchelskopp, "always noble, my dear Klücking! If we owe nothing to the Pastor's family, we owe something to ourselves. And, if Malcheh and Salchen are going too, they must dress themselves up, and then we will set out." This argument gained Pomuchelskopp the permission to array himself in his brown overcoat. He was so rejoiced at having carried his point, a thing which did not often happen, that in his gratitude he desired to confer some pleasure upon his Klücking, and make her a sharer in his own satisfaction; for no one must do Pomuchelskopp the injustice to suppose that he was overbearing in his own house,--no! there he was rather humble and depressed. He pointed, therefore, across the fields and said, "Just look, that is all ours!"