r brother Will
with untold money, wouldn't I? As much as I'd trust the cat with the
cream-pan! I tell you, my dear, it's not all pleasure being a woman of
rank and fashion: and if I have bought a countess's coronet, I have paid
a good price for it--that I have!"

And so had my Lord Castlewood paid a large price for having his estate
freed from incumbrances, his houses and stables furnished, and his
debts discharged. He was the slave of the little wife and her father.
No wonder the old man's society was not pleasant to the poor victim, and
that he gladly slunk away from his own fine house, to feast at the club
when he had money, or at least to any society save that which he found
at home. To lead a bear, as I did, was no very pleasant business, to
be sure: to wait in a bookseller's anteroom until it should please his
honour to finish his dinner and give me audience, was sometimes a hard
task for a man of my name and with my pride; but would I have exchanged
my poverty against Castlewood's ignominy, or preferred his miserable
dependence to my own? At least I earned my wage, such as it was; and no
man can say that I ever flattered my patrons, or was servile to them; or
indeed, in my dealings with them, was otherwise than sulky, overbearing,
and, in a word, intolerable.

Now there was a certain person with whom Fate had thrown me into a
life-partnership, who bore her poverty with such a smiling sweetness
and easy grace, that niggard Fortune relented before her, and, like
some savage Ogre in the fairy tales, melted at the constant goodness and
cheerfulness of that uncomplaining, artless, innocent creature. However
poor she was, all who knew her saw that here was a fine lady; and the
little tradesmen and humble folks round about us treated her with as
much respect as the richest of our neighbours. "I think, my dear," says
good-natured Mrs. Foker, when they rode out in the latter's chariot,
"you look like the mistress of the carriage, and I only as your maid."
Our landladies adored her; the tradesfolk executed her little orders
as eagerly as if a duchess gave them, or they were to make a fortune
by waiting on her. I have thought often of the lady in Comus, and how,
through all the rout and rabble, she moves, entirely serene and pure.

Several times, as often as we chose indeed, the good-natured parents of
my young bear lent us their chariot to drive abroad or to call on the
few friends we had. If I must tell the truth, we dr