did not share the woe
of those whose fate it was to "sojourn in Mesech and dwell in the tents
of Kedar"? that it did not fall to your lot to do the plain sewing and
mending for some Jewish patriarch, patriot, or prophet of yore?

Realize, if you can, the masculine aggravation and the feminine
long-suffering of a period when the head of a family could neither go
down-town, nor even sit at his tent-door, without descrying some
wickedness in high places, some insulting placard, some exasperating
war-bulletin, some offensive order from head-quarters, which caused him
to transform himself instantly into an animated rag-bag. Whereas, in
these women-saving days, similar grievances send President Abraham into
his cabinet to issue a proclamation, the Reverend Jeremiah into his
pulpit with a scathing homily, Poet-Laureate David to the "Atlantic"
with a burning lyric, and Major-General Joab to the privacy of his tent,
there to calm his perturbed spirit with Drake's Plantation Bitters. In
humble imitation of another, I would state that this indorsement of the
potency of a specific is entirely gratuitous, and that I am stimulated
thereto by no remuneration, fluid or otherwise.

Blessed be this day of sewing-machines for women, and of safety-valves
and innocent explosives for their lords!

But this is a digression.

I awoke very early in life to the consciousness that I held the doctrine
which we are considering.

On a hapless day when I was perhaps five years old, I was, in my own
estimation, intrusted with the family-dignity, when I was deposited for
the day at the house of a lordly Pharisee of the parish, with solemnly
repeated instructions in table-manners and the like.

One who never analyzed the mysteries of a sensitive child's heart cannot
appreciate the sense of awful responsibility which oppressed me during
that visit. But all went faultlessly for a time. I corrected myself
instantly each time. I said, "Yes, Ma'am," to Mr. Simon, and "No, Sir,"
to Madam, which was as often as I addressed them; I clenched little
fists and lips resolutely, that they might not touch, taste, handle,
tempting _bijouterie_; I even held in check the spirit of inquiry
rampant within me, and indulged myself with only one question to every
three minutes of time.

At last I found myself at the handsome dinner-table, triumphantly
mounted upon two "Comprehensive Commentaries" and a dictionary, fearing
no evil from the viands before me. Least of