takes to get you a good dinner, and how she
keeps it hot between two plates in the oven, and waits hour after hour
till the dinner gets dried up, and all her morning's work is wasted.
Think how it hurts her, and how anxious she'll be (especially if you're
inclined to booze) for fear that something has happened to you. You
can't get it out of the heads of some young wives that you're liable to
get run over, or knocked down, or assaulted, or robbed, or get into one
of the fixes that a woman is likely to get into. But about the dinner
waiting. Try and put yourself in her place. Wouldn't you get mad under
the same circumstances? I know I would.

"I remember once, only just after I was married, I was invited
unexpectedly to a kidney pudding and beans--which was my favourite grub
at the time--and I didn't resist, especially as it was washing day and
I told the wife not to bother about anything for dinner. I got home an
hour or so late, and had a good explanation thought out, when the wife
met me with a smile as if we had just been left a thousand pounds. She'd
got her washing finished without assistance, though I'd told her to get
somebody to help her, and she had a kidney pudding and beans, with a lot
of extras thrown in, as a pleasant surprise for me.

"Well, I kissed her, and sat down, and stuffed till I thought every
mouthful would choke me. I got through with it somehow, but I've never
cared for kidney pudding or beans since."

Mitchell felt for his pipe with a fatherly smile in his eyes.

"And then again," he continued, as he cut up his tobacco, "your wife
might put on a new dress and fix herself up and look well, and you might
think so and be satisfied with her appearance and be proud to take her
out; but you want to tell her so, and tell her so as often as you think
about it--and try to think a little oftener than men usually do, too."

. . . . .

"You should have made a good husband, Jack," said his mate, in a
softened tone.

"Ah, well, perhaps I should," said Mitchell, rubbing up his tobacco;
then he asked abstractedly: "What sort of a husband did you make, Joe?"

"I might have made a better one than I did," said Joe seriously, and
rather bitterly, "but I know one thing, I'm going to try and make up for
it when I go back this time."

"We all say that," said Mitchell reflectively, filling his pipe. "She
loves you, Joe."

"I know she does," said Joe.

Mitchell lit up.

"And so would any man