Thus I thought, but even yet I did not know the magnificent courage of the woman. Each evening when I returned home she greeted me with the brightest of smiles, and as soon as dinner was over, in our own room, with my arms around her, she insisted on knowing the history of the day in detail. She grasped the situation thoroughly, caressed and encouraged me, always asserting that everything would come out right in the end. She had no fear and did not worry. On the nineteenth of November our child was born. A boy physically perfect. That his lungs were all right I personally could swear to, and what sweet music his crying was to my ears when first I heard it. A little later I was permitted to enter the room, and did so in great agitation. As I kissed my wife and held her hand a few minutes, on her face, more lovely than ever in her motherhood, was the same sweet smile and an expression of devotion and love eternal. I looked at the boy, the new rivet in the chain of love that bound us together, and then, after another kiss, went quietly from the room. Heroes, ancient and modern, the world has developed. Heroines, also have their place in history, but the heroism of a woman in ordinary life, in trials physical and mental, is something to be regarded with awe and reverence. Our wives! Our mothers! Heroines, all. The mother recovered quickly her normal state of health and the boy thrived and grew rapidly. In March, 1874, I was greatly encouraged by a slight improvement in business. I had been through a terribly hard winter, and with the burden of the household on my shoulders had only just succeeded, by the utmost prudence, in making both ends meet. With absolutely no surplus I could not but feel uneasy most of the time. It was while this was the condition of my finances that my most intimate friend, the son of a man of some means, approached me on the subject of getting his brother, then in Europe, but soon to return, into business. I knew his brother, but not intimately. I thought he might make a good business man, and it occurred to me that if he was a hard worker and his father was willing to buy him an interest in my business, I might get efficient aid to my efforts and at the same time get a cash surplus to relieve my mind of financial worry, which I knew to be very desirable; for a man who has to worry about the small expenses of living can never do himself full justice in his business efforts. Another point that induced me to consider the matter was the desire of my wife and myself to go to housekeeping. The relations with my parents and sisters were most pleasant, but now that we had our boy we felt anxious to set up a modest little establishment of our own, and indeed my mother advised it, though she was sorry to have us leave her.