friendly visit, and her husband was generally willing to accompany
her for his wife's sake. I made my best courtesy, therefore, with a
great deal of pleasure, but with no particular surprise at seeing them.
They dismounted and entered the cottage, laughing and talking in great
spirits. I soon heard that they were riding to the same county town
for which my father was bound and that they intended to stay with some
friends there for a few days, and to return home on horseback, as they
went out.

I heard this, and I also discovered that they had been having an
argument, in jest, about money-matters, as they rode along to
our cottage. Mrs. Knifton had accused her husband of inveterate
extravagance, and of never being able to go out with money in his pocket
without spending it all, if he possibly could, before he got home again.
Mr. Knifton had laughingly defended himself by declaring that all his
pocket-money went in presents for his wife, and that, if he spent it
lavishly, it was under her sole influence and superintendence.

"We are going to Cliverton now," he said to Mrs. Knifton, naming the
county town, and warming himself at our poor fire just as pleasantly
as if he had been standing on his own grand hearth. "You will stop to
admire every pretty thing in every one of the Cliverton shop-windows;
I shall hand you the purse, and you will go in and buy. When we
have reached home again, and you have h ad time to get tired of your
purchases, you will clasp your hands in amazement, and declare that you
are quite shocked at my habits of inveterate extravagance. I am only the
banker who keeps the money; you, my love, are the spendthrift who throws
it all away!"

"Am I, sir?" said Mrs. Knifton, with a look of mock indignation. "We
will see if I am to be misrepresented in this way with impunity.
Bessie, my dear" (turning to me), "you shall judge how far I deserve the
character which that unscrupulous man has just given to me. _I_ am the
spendthrift, am I? And you are only the banker? Very well. Banker, give
me my money at once, if you please!"

Mr. Knifton laughed, and took some gold and silver from his waistcoat
pocket.

"No, no," said Mrs. Knifton, "you may want what you have got there for
necessary expenses. Is that all the money you have about you? What do
I feel here?" and she tapped her husband on the chest, just over the
breast-pocket of his coat.

Mr. Knifton laughed again, and produced his pocketbook. His wife
s