The servant did as she was bidden, and the result was that Mrs. Greenfield never again hinted to her husband the desirability of laying the foundation of a thirteenth tribe. THE LOG It was a small drawing-room, with thick hangings, and with a faint, judicious smell of flowers and scents about it. A large fire was burning in the grate, while one lamp, covered with a shade of old lace, on the corner of the mantel-piece threw a soft light onto the two persons who were talking. She, the mistress of the house, was an old lady with white hair, but one of those adorable old ladies whose unwrinkled skin is as smooth as the finest paper, and scented, impregnated with perfume as the delicate essences which she had used in her bath for so many years had penetrated through the epidermis. He was a very old friend, who had never married, a constant friend, a companion in the journey of life, but nothing else. They had not spoken for about a minute, and they were both looking at the fire, dreaming no matter of what, in one of those moments of friendly silence between people who have no need to be constantly talking in order to be happy together, when suddenly a large log, a stump covered with burning roots, fell out. It fell over the fire-dogs into the drawing-room, and rolled onto the carpet, scattering great sparks all round. The old lady sprang up with a little scream, as if she was going to run away, while he kicked the log back onto the hearth and trod out all the burning sparks with his boots. When the disaster was repaired, there was a strong smell of burning, and sitting down opposite to his friend, the man looked at her with a smile, and said, as he pointed to the log: "That is the reason why I never married." She looked at him in astonishment, with the inquisitive gaze of women who wish to know everything, that eye which women have who are no longer very young, in which complicated, and often malicious curiosity is reflected, and she asked: "How so?" "Oh! that is a long story," he replied; "a rather sad and unpleasant story." "My old friends were often surprised at the coldness which suddenly sprang up between one of my best friends, whose Christian name was Julien, and myself. They could not understand how two such intimate and inseparable friends as we had been could suddenly become almost strangers to one another, and I will tell you the reason of it. "He and I used to live together at one time. We were never apart, and the friendship that united us seemed so strong that nothing could break it. "One evening when he came home, he told me that he was going to get married, and it gave me a shock as if he had robbed me or betrayed me. When a man's friend marries, it is all over between them. The jealous affection of a woman, that suspicious, uneasy, and carnal affection, will not tolerate that sturdy and frank attachment, that attachment of the mind, of the heart, and mutual confidence which exists between two men.