t of, being a thin, sharp-nosed, ferret-eyed, little woman,
teeming with suspicion, jealousy, and bad humours of every description:
her whole employment (we may say, her whole delight) was in finding
fault: her shrill voice was to be heard from the other side of the
street from morning until night. The one servant which their finances
enabled them with difficulty to retain, and whom they engaged as the
maid of all work (and certainly she was not permitted by Mrs Forster to
be idle in her multifarious duty), seldom remained above her _month_;
and nothing but the prospect of immediate starvation could induce any
one to offer herself in that capacity.

Mr Nicholas Forster, fortunately for his own happiness, was of that
peculiar temperament, that nothing could completely rouse his anger; he
was _absent_ to an excess; and if any language or behaviour on the part
of his wife induced his choler to rise, other ideas would efface the
cause from his memory; and this hydra of the human bosom, missing the
object of its intended attack, again laid down to rest.

The violence and vituperation of his spouse were, therefore, lost upon
Nicholas Forster; and the impossibility of disturbing the equanimity of
his temper increased the irritability of her own. Still Mr Nicholas
Forster, when he did reflect upon the subject, which was but during
momentary fits of recollection, could not help acknowledging that he
should be much more quiet and happy when it pleased Heaven to summon
Mrs Forster to a better world: and this idea ultimately took possession
of his imagination. Her constant turbulence interfered so much with the
prosecution of his plans, that, finding it impossible to carry them into
execution, every thing that he considered of moment was mentally put off
until _Mrs Forster was dead_!

"Well, Mr Forster, how long is the dinner to wait before you think
proper to come? Every thing will be cold as usual."--(n.b., the dinner
consisted of the remains of a cold shoulder of mutton.)--"Or do you mean
to have any dinner at all? Betty, clear away the table; I have my work
to do, and won't wait any longer."

"I'm coming, my dear, I'm coming; only this balance spring is a job that
I cannot well leave," replied Nicholas, continuing his vocation in the
shop, with a magnifying glass attached to his eye.

"Coming! yes, and Christmas is coming Mr Forster.--Well, the dinner's
going, I can tell you."

Nicholas, who did not want appetite, an