my overcoat and express my cold in a passionate cough, as I
remark that its agency in this matter forcibly reminds me of a chap I
once knew in the sixth ward.

He was an aged chap of much red nose, my boy, and lived with his
youngest broadcloth son in the same house with his Wayward Sister. The
Wayward Sister being an old maid of severe countenance, occupied such
portions of the residence as seemed most safe from the intrusion of
that sex which seeks to make Woman its broken-hearted slave; and as
long as the patient old chap answered the door-bell and didn't smoke in
the house, she got along with him after the manner of a Methodist
angel. Things went on pleasantly through the winter, the high-minded
maiden using the coal of her aged kindred, and employing all his black
tea without complaining; but in the spring she joined a Woman's Rights
Convention, and commenced to hold indignation-meetings of
virtuously-indignant females in the best room in the house. These
meetings having decided, that,

"_Whereas_, Man is a ojus creature which is constantly preying upon
that sex which it is his mother's, and denying to it those inalienable
Rights without which Woman's sphere cannot exist. Therefore be it

"_Resolved_, That Woman is the Superior Sex.

"_Resolved_, That union with man is incompatible with the good of a sex
which it is ourselves; and that we will immediately take that household
furniture of which Woman is the only rightful owner, and only ask to be
let alone."

The aged chap received a copy of these resolutions, my boy, and says
the Wayward Sister: "I can no longer consent to live in the same house
with an inferior being." The chap heard her in silence, and might have
let her have her own way, under ordinary circumstances, but when he
came home next night he found that she had packed up all the furniture
in the house to carry off with her, and expected him to give her his
watch and night-key. He scratched his head, and says he: "I cannot
permit this sort of thing, because I really want some furniture for my
own use." The Wayward Sister threw her thimble at him, and says she:
"Our male parient bought this furniture only because he got married to
one of the Superior Sex; and as it was Woman which solely occasioned
its purchase, it clearly belongs to Woman."

But the chap could not see it in this light, my boy; and as soon as his
son came home he told him all about it. The manly youth took a look up
the stairs to