merest necessaries of life. Is this what you want? Degrade
your wife, or bring in conflict two contrary, hostile interests--"

Such, for three quarters of the French people is an exact definition
of marriage.

"Be perfectly easy, dear," resumes Caroline, seating herself in her
chair like Marius on the ruins of Carthage, "I will never ask you for
anything. I am not a beggar! I know what I'll do--you don't know me
yet."

"Well, what will you do?" asks Adolphe; "it seems impossible to joke
or have an explanation with you women. What will you do?"

"It doesn't concern you at all."

"Excuse me, madame, quite the contrary. Dignity, honor--"

"Oh, have no fear of that, sir. For your sake more than for my own, I
will keep it a dead secret."

"Come, Caroline, my own Carola, what do you mean to do?"

Caroline darts a viper-like glance at Adolphe, who recoils and
proceeds to walk up and down the room.

"There now, tell me, what will you do?" he repeats after much too
prolonged a silence.

"I shall go to work, sir!"

At this sublime declaration, Adolphe executes a movement in retreat,
detecting a bitter exasperation, and feeling the sharpness of a north
wind which had never before blown in the matrimonial chamber.

THE ART OF BEING A VICTIM.

On and after the Revolution, our vanquished Caroline adopts an
infernal system, the effect of which is to make you regret your
victory every hour. She becomes the opposition! Should Adolphe have
one more such triumph, he would appear before the Court of Assizes,
accused of having smothered his wife between two mattresses, like
Shakespeare's Othello. Caroline puts on the air of a martyr; her
submission is positively killing. On every occasion she assassinates
Adolphe with a "Just as you like!" uttered in tones whose sweetness is
something fearful. No elegiac poet could compete with Caroline, who
utters elegy upon elegy: elegy in action, elegy in speech: her smile
is elegiac, her silence is elegiac, her gestures are elegiac. Here are
a few examples, wherein every household will find some of its
impressions recorded:

AFTER BREAKFAST. "Caroline, we go to-night to the Deschars' grand ball
you know."

"Yes, love."

AFTER DINNER. "What, not dressed yet, Caroline?" exclaims Adolphe, who
has just made his appearance, magnificently equipped.

He finds Caroline arrayed in a gown fit for an elderly lady of strong
conversational powers, a black moire with