swearing among the men,
and hysteria among the women, and we should all do as Burns did when
he had only one troublesome tooth--kick the furniture about--really,
or figuratively."

"Poor Emma! I do love her! I do love her! If there is anything on
earth I love, it is Emma. But Antony is simply absurd. He insists on
the whole house teething, too. He will have no company; and some one
has to sit by Emma's cot all night because, he says, 'she must need
cold water often,' and when I told him this morning that we had all
gone through the same suffering once in our lives, he looked at me as
if he thought I was a brute. I was only trying to aggravate him. He
ought not to tempt me to aggravate him; for I cannot help doing it.
And of course, I love Emma far better than he does. I nearly died for
her. I was provoked with Antony this morning."

"What does the doctor say?"

"He says baby is to go to the mountains, so we are to have the
Woodsome house; and papa and mamma are going to Europe. Papa wants
'authorities.' I should think the British Museum may perhaps satisfy
him."

"We are going to Woodsome also, this summer. How soon will you leave
the city?"

"That is what we are disputing about. Antony wants to go at once. I
want to give one, just one, farewell dance before shutting myself up
for months. I wish you could have seen Antony's face when I proposed
it. I just wish you could! It was awful! He said '_No_,' and he stood
on '_No_,' and nothing short of an earthquake could have moved him. I
simply hate Antony, when he is so ugly; and I told him I hated him."

"But it is not right to dance and feast when your child is so ill,
Rose."

"My baby is no worse than other babies in the same condition. I am so
weary of all the trouble. I feel like running away and hiding myself
from every one. I wish I were in some place where Antony, and mamma,
and Harry, and every one, could not be perpetually saying, 'You must
not do this,' or, 'You must do that.' The other day I heard of a
heavenly land, where the sun always shines, and the flowers always
bloom, and loving and dancing and singing and feasting make up the
whole of life."

"Oh, Rose! Rose! That is a very earthly land, indeed."

"A woman has no youth in this country. And I shall only be a very
little time young now. I do grudge spending my young days in gloom,
and sorrow, and scolding. It is too bad. If I should fly away to some
wilderness, would you take care of my baby, Y