rows them into fits
of laughter, superior men, perceiving no word that will fit all the
explanations, will sooner give it up than make three unsuccessful
attempts. According to the law of this innocent game you are condemned
to return to the parlor after leaving a forfeit; but you are so
exceedingly puzzled by your wife's answers, that you ask what the word
was.

"Mal," exclaims a young miss.

You comprehend everything but your wife's replies: she has not played
the game. Neither Madame Deschars, nor any one of the young women
understand. She has cheated. You revolt, there is an insurrection
among the girls and young women. They seek and are puzzled. You want an
explanation, and every one participates in your desire.

"In what sense did you understand the word, my dear?" you say to
Caroline.

"Why, _male_!" [male.]

Madame Deschars bites her lips and manifests the greatest displeasure;
the young women blush and drop their eyes; the little girls open theirs,
nudge each other and prick up their ears. Your feet are glued to the
carpet, and you have so much salt in your throat that you believe in a
repetition of the event which delivered Lot from his wife.

You see an infernal life before you; society is out of the question.

To remain at home with this triumphant stupidity is equivalent to
condemnation to the state's prison.

Axiom.--Moral tortures exceed physical sufferings by all the difference
which exists between the soul and the body.

THE ATTENTIONS OF A WIFE.

Among the keenest pleasures of bachelor life, every man reckons the
independence of his getting up. The fancies of the morning compensate
for the glooms of evening. A bachelor turns over and over in his bed: he
is free to gape loud enough to justify apprehensions of murder, and
to scream at a pitch authorizing the suspicion of joys untold. He can
forget his oaths of the day before, let the fire burn upon the hearth
and the candle sink to its socket,--in short, go to sleep again in spite
of pressing work. He can curse the expectant boots which stand holding
their black mouths open at him and pricking up their ears. He can
pretend not to see the steel hooks which glitter in a sunbeam which has
stolen through the curtains, can disregard the sonorous summons of the
obstinate clock, can bury himself in a soft place, saying: "Yes, I
was in a hurry, yesterday, but am so no longer to-day. Yesterday was
a dotard. To-day is a sage: between them stan