g her own
way; half the time she's only testing you, and she doesn't really want
what she pretends to want. Of course, I'm speaking of before marriage;
after marriage she always wants it, and she's going to have it, anyway,
and the sooner you find that out and give in, the better. You must
consider this, however, that her way after marriage is always laid down
to her with reference to your good. She thinks about you a great deal
more than you do about her, and she's always working out something that
is for your advantage; she'll let you do some things as you wish, just
to make you believe you are having your own way, but she's just been
pretending to think otherwise, to make you feel good.'

"This sounded so much like sense that I asked him how much a man
ought to stand from a woman. 'Stand, sir?' he said; 'why, everything,
everything that does not take away his self-respect.' I said I believed
if he'd let a woman do it she'd wipe her shoes on him. 'Why, of course
she will,' he said, 'and why shouldn't she? A man is not good enough
for a good woman to wipe her shoes on. But if she's the right sort of a
woman she won't do it in company, and she won't let others do it at all;
she'll keep you for her own wiping.'"

"There's a lot of sense in that, Lesponts," said one of his auditors, at
which there was a universal smile of assent. Lesponts said he had found
it out, and proceeded.

"Well, we got to a little town in Virginia, I forget the name of it,
where we had to stop a short time. The Captain had told me that his home
was not far from there, and his old company was raised around there.
Quite a number of the old fellows lived about there yet, he said, and he
saw some of them nearly every time he passed through, as they 'kept the
run of him.' He did not know that he'd 'find any of them out to-day, as
it was Christmas, and they would all be at home,' he said. As the train
drew up I went out on the platform, however, and there was quite a crowd
assembled. I was surprised to find it so quiet, for at other places
through which we had passed they had been having high jinks: firing off
crackers and making things lively. Here the crowd seemed to be quiet
and solemn, and I heard the Captain's name. Just then he came out on the
platform, and someone called out: 'There he is, now!' and in a second
such a cheer went up as you never heard. They crowded around the old
fellow and shook hands with him and hugged him as if he had been a