The Dorset County Express and Agricultural Gazette.
Dorchester, Dorset, England, 1871-12-26 00:00:00

TIIE BEST OF HUSBANDS.

Toni awl I were inseparables. They called tne
the Siamese twins until a dainty little waist, with
don,' of muslin flowing from it, Sidled in between us,
awl held the position. how the owner of that
iLiity waist 1114 managed to secure her hold on Tom
is his dead secret. I did notice, indeed, though very
Itsy at the time, that Tom had hung up his rod in
the best part of the fishing season, though he became
Ititial to hosting excursions on the Thames and pie-
sat Twickenham. His dress suddenly assumed •
fa-hionable phase, and it WM quite plain he yearned
f iii freedom of a freize coat, and was not altoge-
ii•r nifoitable in tight sleeves. By degrees he
opp. .1 ill crillirg into our club of nights, and seemed
to I, oppressed by something heavy On his mind. I
krew it could be nothing connected with pecuniary
for Toni was really well off, and hill money
rt ly in my hands. An uncle had thought it
riOt 1.. die before he was tired of the world, or the
5i.11.1 tired of V , and he bequeathed Tom very
il.;:ible lessons for remembering Lim. Tom, ton,
vi • e, "inimically inclined, and though, like any other
W of twenty•five, be liked a bit of fun, lie never
ewit Icy, ml b, unds. I accounted for Tom's conduct
1 y supposing that be Lail a tit of indigestion—not an
unlikely thing, sieing that previously to what I may
conk retirement, he indulged in devilled kidneys
awl "tell whiskey at a rather early hour of the
morning. But he puzzled me for all that, for he began
talking about insurances and investments, preference
shares, and Lloyd's bonds, and asked my opinion,
seeing I was an incipient stock-broker and his bosom
friend, respecting the best mode of providing for 1,'"4
future of an anticipated family. He told me, IsA
seeing my puzzled look, that his aunt—his
omit, huh eli —was about to commit matrimony,
snit of course was anxious concerning the destiny of
pcsssible small images of sin. . _

-"
The best of husbands, you know," said Tom,
"the eery best of husbands may make mistakes, and
as I an, nty aunt's trustee, it is my duty to do the best
for her and sundry cousins should they appear."
I had never heard before of this 'aunt" of his,
lonn I took to be a sober, middle-aged person, who
to help the curate by marrying him. lint at
Is I saw her, by foimal invitation, at St. George's,
1; ersimare. She answered to the name of "Tiny,'
at;.l v-as no more Tom's aunt than I was. She was
so ortty, so winsome, so bright, so joyous, that when
o let .mony was over, and we had all tosponded in
11 o I. it:tome way to the toast of "Mrs. Tom," in
i• thanks as best man, I blurted out my deep
1.-iet lint I had not seen my friend's aunt before, and
an, told but this is probably ill-nature,—that I in-
quired whether she had a sister the image of herself.
ar toe what light that cloud of muslin would shake
around it in these great, dark, silent rooms of mind
Tom and Tiny, after the usual fashion, hid themselves
in I ietonsliire. When they returned from what is
oddly but usually called the honeymoon, he said
Tiny - "0, your aunt," said I—wislied to know me
ery well. ,'sing I had been the best and most con-
lid, mita fticiul of!,', Toni. 0 the artful ways of
.. . .

..... ....... .
ii p,1111`,..•• mid pretty ! She invited me to- tea;
she requested the pleasure--nit the honour—of my
company to dinner. She wished me to join them at
the ti entre, and share their little supper after. But
dnrimf the whole time she was pumping me,
liteially and truly pumping me, as to honest
Tom's antecedents. She wormed everything out
..r Ille ss ithout my knowing it— all about the
little Jewess, who sold cigars round the corner, and
the blue eyed Christian who "Ind up" Tom's shirts
and to ekties. As she lieser did up mine, I acrinil-
plitair!i, quite innocently, a tremendous deal of
mischief, it appears. The truth is Mrs. Toni told
ine, quite confidentially, that she could not care for
nian who hail not been a favourite with "the girls,"
Lod that for her part she tl glut men made better
I for hosing been a little will. I. on in
ii.!, , Wird to make Tom a hero, and accordingly I
lii not deteriorate from his achievements when
itii, it son siiir !Amin. But, somehow, when I had
no mote to tell, or niy imagination failed me, I WAS
not no often asked to dinner or tea, or that cozy little
supper after the theatre. Toni said, "Tiny was
delicate, and required quiet, and a deal of petting."
lie .niil," I had made mischief, and that I was a fool
not to know I should have kept all dark." After
this e‘planatim Tom ;4TM uncommonly grave and
steady, and wide alsint the belt. The dainty waist,
ith its descending fountain of muslin, had broken
him in, and he went awfully quiet in harness.
(hie day Tom came to my office. He bail been
about ten months' married to "Ilia aunt" now, and
said lie wished to effect a transfer. He seemed to
be in mist exuberant spirits inside, but outside he
really looked 11.4 if lie hail neither slept or dressed for
a week. An episode in the wedded bliss of my es-
ti, toed but fat brother-in-law came into my mind.
When his wife was about to bless her lord,and make
him universally uncomfortable, a frowny, ordorous
muse scowled at him, and said "He was an unfeel-
ing brute," becaloe• he laughed when the doctor came,
not knowing ac. 011 t else to do. So, frowned
upon and soluble!, lie stowed himself away in the
dist kennel until the business Wali over, and all were
shouting for him to wish him joy. I felt an undtweri-
lead° sort of commiseration for poor old Tom, and
made him promise to sup with me that night. Do
pet know the poor fellow enjoyed his ham and chicken
with hot lobster after as if be were really hungry? He
imilonlitedly found pleasure in a bottle ortwo of sound
claret. Gradually be opened' his heart to me, as in
the old time. siel T found that for ten days or Ito Tout
Inv' Is. fore, Ito tali., his dinner on the stairs or in
the lobby, and that every fireplace in his house had
1..--,, blocked up by "horses," bearing an infinite
variety of small articles, which prove that
if we liring nothing into the world, our babies
require us to prepare a great number of warm articles
for their reception. Tom, has, in fart, been living
in an atmosphere moist and unpleasant from the
nirim: of small clothes. He is snubbed, frowned
upon. and onlerial about to no end by Sarah Gamp
and Co. lie hears that the invasion of awful women
will end in a month and then there will remain lint
mother-in-law and baby's nurse. There was an odd
twitch of the mouth when Tom mentioned his mother-
in-law, which plainly said to me that he would be
right glail to put her too out upon the steps—hand-
Is nod --if he dared. Poor old Tom comforts
himeelf oith the assurance that such a ease as this
moo mile occur at worst once a year, or thereabrinta,
nail lo• breonie a social philosopher if not in-
deed a mord reformer, he is making up 'his mind to
grin lls ar it. . . .

.....
It was A curious awl yet a painful spectacle to wit-
pt.: Ton's fight within himself over the Oronooko
atol ut Cavendish. Tiny, after she was married,
coal not abide the smell of tobacco smoke, though
she so Lurch the fragrance of a real Ilavannah when
Tom whiffed it away among the roses, with his right
arm garrotting her waist. She insisted, playfully,
ms.it Tom's company continuously, being nervous and
timid. If Tom stole away for a solitary whiff, she had
the finest no, in the world for detecting the odour in
his clothes or hair. That amber colours-ti meershaurn,
who, gradual browning he haul watched with so
much pride and interest, was hung up. it seem,
over his study mantelpiece, with a morsel of crape
about the stem—in memoriam. But now Tom looked
at the Cavendish, fiddled with the Cavendish, pulled
the Cavenulkh out tenderly, and rolled it gently up
again. Ile smelt it, and dilated on its fine quality.
Mechanivally, and, I suppose in charity, unconsciously
lie took up a pipe, looked at the stem and
!sod. ldew through it, and by mere instinct
filled it. Most naturally he placeul the stem in his
mouth, and when I was wicked enough to apply a
to the howl, he kept never minding. but drew
short quick puffs, as if he really liked it. What would
I have given. ti enjoy such a smoke as his, after a four
or five months fast? In his deep enjoyment Tom
forgot the Sarah Camps—the mother-in-law and her
innumerably band-boxes. Ile forgave his banishment
from parlour and drawing-rooms, and the appropria-
tion, for his son and heir, of all the fires in the house
during the month of November. I will not say he
forgot Tiny or the baby, for at the fourth pipe and
our third bottle, As well as I remember—it was not the
Chancellor's claret- he began to talk solemnly, but
somewhat wildly, I thought, and insisted that there
was a general conspiracy entered into by half mankind
against precious and interesting childhood.
" T tell you what, old fellow," said he, "it is a
really serious matter. I will have to refurnish my
subtle house, unless I am contented to be an acces-
sory to possible murder. I say Jack " that is my
familar name, "the upholsterers, ironmongers, and
innt.e.furni.liers, seem to me be in league with the
undertaker. Don't tell me the acrobat fellows who
do Creek statutes in public gardens, when the eaat
wind blows or the grass is wet, liar,- not an understand-
ing with the apothecaries; or that the modistes, I be-
lieve that is the correct term now, who devise such
immodest dresses, have not made their arrangements
with the doctors. I say, for toy part, that an exhibi-
tion, or a ball, or a grand croquet match in dripping
weather, is grist to the doctor's mill. There woold
be little for animated pill-boxes to do if people
would only talc. care of themselves, and let
the India • rubber brothers alone when the

evenings are so wet that the rockets won't go
Now, jack, look at that fender of yours, and sup-
pose von are married, and have a baby. Don't start,
'event, are is...dlde vet: and I ought to tell
yon tl.at Tiny has a little sister, who will be spoken
for 60111 C day, and who is coming to us as soon as lean
eject my aboni— adorable mother-in-law. Look,
now, I say, at that fender. Why, it is all toothed
sound the top-edge with Fenian pikes of brilliant
'tee!. Fancy previous lathy knocking his soft young
head against that .410Year-de-trine. You do not know
yet how inivasy tables are about the head. Nature
prompts them, I suppose, to loosen the joints of the
vertebra., that they may be able to nod, like Lord
hirleigh, hereafter. What is the use of these spikes?
TI y won't allow you to rest the sole of your
r, up.ll the edge of the fender, and look at the faces
in the fire comfortably. They will catch in the
bottom of your trousers. The tailors come in there;
or you hear a delicate little scream, and the rasp of a
inublen reef, as your wife's new dress hooks in the
Fpil;,*, and comes to grief. Camp and Co. drive
3..11 down to the kitchen, if your feet are wet or cold,
and if admitted to the parlour in candle time, you
must give the fouler a wide berth. Babies have not
iv... your sense, ant I say again they have an odd
way f knocking their heads about. Flow would you
like to hear a cry from your little Jack, and see his
head fixed on one of these horrible steel prongs, like
an impaled cockchafer? I am told these prongs are
for ornament, but I know better; they are gins and
traps hail for the baby."
"Take this pair of tongs in your hand; they
are of the normal fashion ; just feel the weight
of them. A small clippers would answer all useful
purposes. "Her often people wield the poker
tl y not .lo much with the tongs. But these things
may fall on baby. life would be sure some day to pull
down the instnunent if destruction Ull himself aloe he
Is five months old. You see the top is armed with is
formidabls pikehead as well we the fender—they muse
all be of uniform pattern, you know. No chance of
killing an infant is neglected. Should he, when he tod-
dies *Unit, mhei the fate of tripping over the fender,
limbo purposely low, and running his head under the
grate, the tongs will be sure to dinge in his skull,
lie the spike will coMPlete the business. Yee, your
chairs arc very comfortable. I find this one very
much so at present. They are handsome, too, velvet
cushions and backs, and all that; but will you explain to
me, on any rational theory, why itit is that the corners
of tbe seals en ell ellarp-olood and plated? Look it

the rasor-like levilling running down the ; ja,t
feel the points of these outa-'nual ornaments knobs,
I call them—jutting out I rionthe legs every four inches.
If you please, try how A cry achy a chair is toi pled
over. Mamma loves to place baby on the talpet Lir
your delectation, and hee 111111 kick and crow there.
He hobs ls•autiful then :IS b ”.ses lii. anns
and legs about. Ent he keep me in a fever. Mamma
thinks, you know, that he was an angel, and now tries
tA, flap his wings. But the uplaisterer has his plot
against Lim. It in wit generally known that many
uplusterere are also undertaken,. Alas! for p..or baby
if, in his fun—l don't know whether he understawfs
it, but 11111111111 a and papa do -if in his fun, I Ray, he
pelts down or topples (MCI' elle tif your grand Louis
goatorze chairs upon lihusclf. and bawla for the doe-
ton I assure you babies CM bat. I sometimee, angels
as they are.
"You have no experienee, or that prescience which
is better than experience. You don't imagine, there-
fore, but I feel, how artfully the conspiracy against
baby life is planned. Here is this table now, at which
you and I sit so er): pleasantly. Wind your watch
and don't mind me ; "hours, u• " you know, "ere made
for slaves," as we used to sing once in the gissl old
times. Send me over the Cavendish. Nurse, I am sure,
will be asleep when I get home. I saw the neck of a
black bottle under the valance of her easy chair before
I came out Tiny, of course, is long since "made up"
for the night, and dreaming about baby. was
I? It aye, the table. You see that if baby by any
chance does not pin his head on the fender, or knock
it against the chairs, he will certainly be caught by
some part of your table when he runs alone. The
corners are all as sharp as the carpenter's plane can
tunke them. No one wants a sharp corner to the table
he sits at. Why should he? All the ends of these
articles of furniture ought to be nicely munded at the
corners, even for our comfort after dinner. They would
be so only for the conspiracy. Thbi ledge, keen An a
knife, projects all round, you see; and underneath that
again the moulding is brought to an acute angle. The
hob, tablv.toPls a plot against baby from the moment
he begins to toddle until he is five years old. His dar-
ling head is sure to come in contact with it during some
thne in three years.
"What a little thing am I: hardly higher than
the table," lisps out baby, and lights up mamma's eyes;
but I wish he were higher, for a bruise on the shoulder
or chest is not quite so had as one on the forehead,
or just under the eye, or on the bridge of his dear,
soft little nose. Babies and yming children have a
passion— see how the cabinetmakers have taken note
of it -cf running wildly ro I tables, playing at
1., rota or limiting minium Few of them but come to
grief sometimes with these projecting corners as they
run round, looking behind them to see if you are ad-
miring them. You hear a soft crash; baby falls awl
screams. It is worse far, the doctor tells me, if he
don't screen]. Then a pink thread of young blood
ti icicles down the pale face, and you run madly for the
doctor, uhile 1.11.101:1111 elape a cold snesithing iron on
the place, and sends the meid servant to hunt the
ciedhole for a cobweb.. _
_

" l'ut I cannot unfold to you one-half of the traria
laiil for babies in the drawlng.roomm or parlours. The
very window sills are all .harp-edged, And f course
it is faybionable to hair them low, to give baby a
chance of cutting his arm by breaking a pane, or of
falling out of the window. Tin surbase is sharp
below, is, are the edges of the chiffoniers and side-
lsards ; but perhaps the greatest peril lies in the show.
tail.- that trap for dust and shreds, covered with it,
gaolY cloth, and bearing all manner of curiosities,
uncovered or under glass shades, which are always as
slinky as if they were intoxicated. If baby hut
catches hold of one end of the tablecloth, lie will
m.-lin-dly put it in his mouth. Babies, like sucking-
bae, a fancy for swallowing everything. If
1, by ho any way strong, then woe to I awl your
collection. I rescued an infant °Me from an a% Manche
of ...idly (kiwis, and vowed that if tner I hail a Child
w,-Old banish all curiosities but himself. Tiny, how.
r. objects to babiNh the Indian gods li:ought home
bv .oine ;,,,lpapa of hers. Nurse tells me that to
"cross Tiny now in her young maternity would lie
ruin to hr end babe too. Si. I oxp- it that some day
1,,V Imto will pun doe ti lepton 1 • self two or three
mod" and that horrible jar of young rattle
pi:al.,. preserved in the atrongest ppirite of wine—
another ease of running for the doctor. _

" yes: there are rooms met paart in houses for
babies. 'lle intended bride, in selecting her future
leolo., always thinks of a nursery, though she
doe. not sped; of it. It o ores natural to them
you know. Theo: are at presea in my small house
thee • marseries for the one baby ; but w hen 'riny's
sister conies, there will he but one, I an: told. Nurse—
I inezm Sarah Camp went out for an airing yester-
day. I think the air in our neighbourhood must smell
necomnionly of whiskey betimes, nurse's clothe.' filled
the staircase with the odour, when she returned, and
mounted to the nursery with unusual gravity and
silence. If mippose it is because we live so near the
d.cks. BM while she WM swan", I stole LP to the
nursery, and looked about. There were the same
plots all over again. The fender, indeol, had no
'pikes, only a sharp thin edge of sheet iron. There
were the cutting legs of treacherous chairs, and the
sharp corners of haml tables. Then, if baby should
overl.alance himself, and tumble out of his cot, he wnuld
have a nice fall .4 full three feet; and, of course, he
weuld comedown straight on Lie head. Rabies always
do come 410W11 on their heads, and then another fee
for Om doctor, and a fortnight's fright to mamma.
The bed pods are all of square oak, nicely sharpened
on the (Agee. And as for bahy'e chair, which my
prudent motherin-law bow:lit at an auction in antid-
patio'', it wan moet ingeniously contrived to turn
over, nwl .awash Om leo+ if Tiny Tom's skull, if he
tho w up his .. as he is sore to all:.
Ilow long Old Tom continued in this strain,
I cannot precisely tell. I remendwr that as
I exhaled the glorious orommkos, and looked into
the blue cloud before me, I saw, dimly, it is
true, dainty bodices of violet velvet, with snow-drifts
of white muslin (lowing down. I saw baby and his
leuesinette, and the drewlful company of Camp and
Co. : and then me thought baby crowed and spread
out his none, and fell down, down, down, to depths
unfathomable. I heard, in my reverie, the lmocks
of baby's head against the ledges of hard rock as he
swung from precipice to precipice, I following in vain,
with a railing motion. At last he seemed to have
rawbed place when, the ledges ',truck out thickly: it
was nothing lint knock, knock, knock, and at lad,
wreooldng my thoughts together. I found there was
a frightful rattle at my door. Tom peered through •
chmd of nronooko and cavendish smoke, and glared
upon me atolidle. " Camp and C 0.," said be'
what is to be clone." "Leave her or them to
Bahl T, "and make your way home. Have you a lateh
keyr "No,' said, he. "The fact is, Tiny said Weil
keys wear out the coat pockets, and we must be
eeonomical." Rap, rap, rap, each rap more vigorous
than the find. Away scuttles Tom through the
garden and over tho wall. lie thinks he can aqueeze
through the kitchen window, lie suspects the Guards-
man elders that way to see his cousin, the cook.
Flo now for Mrs. Gamp. All ready—the kettle
iii it the Regal% four large lumps, in the tumbler,
the lemon close beside, no tempting—the camp nature
could not stand it—with the addition of a silver
crown. It seems they missed Tom rather early in the
evening, and sent to the Fire Brien& to inquire
almnt him. Then some one suggested that they should
drag the Serpentine. Mee. Clamp was rosily by the
end of her third posset—the would not call it tumbler
for the world—to swear to anything I toll her.
"Tom," TRAM, " had been with me, lilt lie had returned
home ever so Inng ago, lie is out of his fleet sleep by
this time." At last I was compelled to support the
nurse in the cab all the way to her home, and I had
the satisfaction of hearing Tom in his night-shirt and
tfloboots delivering her a lecture upon intemperance,
while I held her up on the steps.

Ilicornv.—Claiming a right to set everybody's
dial by your own watch.
A good man who has seen much. of the
worki, nod is not tired of it, sap'. "The grand esse-
tials to happiness are something to do, something to
love, and something to hope for."
When fresh water fishes get into salt water,
they ~vim near the surface, and the converse of this
w.tiecabic in regard to marine fishes. When these
find their way into fredt water, they usually remain
at the bottom of the stream.

There are about 83,00,000 head of cattle in
Texas. one-fourth being beeves, one-fourth cows, n.n4
the other half yearlines and two-year-olds. 750,000
calvcn are raised and brandeti ever year. All are
reare,l on the crest Texas plans, which cover an area
of 152,n0v0n acre*.

Some time ago an erroneous report was put in
circulation of the abdication of the King of Prussia.
It WaS accounted for in this way: The telegraph, af-
ter due warning, one day said, " The—King—of
Prooda—has--gone—to—Pot." The magnetic inter-
preter at the tele:mh, being an excitable politician,
soil quick at jumping to a conclusion, in another
minute the communication wan on ita way to the news.
paper office. Again the dial was agitated, and then
came "edam," making it read thus, "The King of
Prussia has gone to Potedam."—Scoich Rehrnitre
Gra:ette.

SIR WALTER SCOTT AND THE ARCHITECT
OF 1117 SCOTT MONtllENT.—Tiailie Cousin, in a letter
to the Se,,tsynno, says that George Kemp, the archi-
tect of the Scott Monument, was not &common mason,
as has been stated. but that he was a highlytrained
architect Mr. Cousin relates the following singular
Incident, which he has heard Kemp relate :—"When
an apprentice to a country tradestnan somewhere in
the neighlsentood of Peebles (I forget where), he was
tnulging along the public road on a warm summer
day, hmiling in the sun, with his tools swung over his
shoulder, when a gentleman's carriage drove past. It
stopped. The eentleman asked the youth where he
was going, nul r ling it was in the same direction, he
desired the f a to take up the younker beside
him. This Is, the first time Kemp saw Scott, who,
with wonted benevolence. had compassion on the
wayworn traveller, and thus became associated by
an act of kindness with the man who, as the archi-
tect of his monument, was thus to be associated with
lam for ever."

FLORILINI I—For the Terra awl GREAT/L—A fuh
drops of the Fragrant F/oriline on • wet tooth brus
produsesa delightiful foam, whioh cleanses the Tee'h
from all impurities, strengthens arid hardens the gums,
prevents tartar, and arrests the progross of de c ty. It
gives to the Teeth • peculiar and beautiful w
end imparts a delightful fregranoe to the breath. It
removes ill unpleasant odour arrising hum dtc.yed
teeth, • disordered stomach, or tobacco smoke. Ihe
Fragrant Ploriliu is purely vegetable, and equally
adapted to old and young. It Is the greatest Toilet
discovery of the age. Sold at 2s GI by all Chemist'
and Perfumers. Prepared only by U. C. GALLUP, 493
Orford Street, London. The word " Floriline " is a
" Trede *irk."
1128. WINSLOW'S SOOTHING STROP FOR CHILDREN I
Should always be need when children are cutti,,g
teeth ; it relieves the little sufferers at once, it pre-
dimes nature] quiet sleep by relieving the child from
pain, and the little cherub awakes "U bright at •
button." It is perfectly harmless, and very pleasant to
taste. It soothes the child, it softens the gums allays
all pain, relieves wind, regulate' the bowels, and is tile
best known remedy for dysentery and diarrho3s, whether
arising from teething or other causes. Mrs. Winslow's
Soothing Syrup is sold by thousands of Medicine dealers
In all puts of the world at Is lad. per bottle, and
ILilllosis of Mother, cam testify to its virtas.—Mans•
factory, 483, Oilordpstissk Loads'.