Belmont chronicle. [volume] (St. Clairsville, Ohio) 1855-1973, 1857-07-02
Gboitt Misttuallp,
From the Olive Branch.
ONLY A HUSBAND.
BY T. g. ARTHUR

'Thank youI' What musical ring was
in the voice o. Mrs. Archer; what pleas
ant light shone in her eyes. She b ID Drop
ped glove which gentleman had lifted
from the floor and placed in her hand.
Mr Archer, the lady's husband, saw the
little act of courtesy, and noticed itsreward.
He would have given almost anything for
just such musical thank you.'-for as
bright glance as she had thrown upon a
. stranger.-Once, tones and giances like
these had been his reward for any little at
tioDs he might happen TO offer; new Ill the
courtesies of life were withdrawn, and no
matter what the act or its quality, his wife
received it with cold indifference, ,singu larly
in contrast toward other men.
Was it defect of love! Did Mrs. Ar
cher really think more highly of other men,
who showed her polite attentions. than she
did of her husband. Sometimes a chafed
feeling of NEUTRALITY-SUSPICIOUS. of zeal
ously-and sometimes of mournful regret
for summer days in the far away past, would
trouble the husband sorely. But these were
passed aside, or suffered to die for the lack
Va oiiulCul,ouu luc IOutiu6 Vi EVERY
day life permitted to have lis usual course.
On the occasion referred to above, Mr..
Archer and his wife>was spending an eve-
ming at the house of a friend, where CON-
pany had been invited. For days previously
the countenance of Mrs. Archer had worn
its usual dead calm, its limperturbed placid
ity-its matter of course aspect. She had
talked with her husband in kind of dead
level tone and manner on all subjects that
happened to come up, whether of first or
third importance.
Or, ifinterest happened to rise to any
thing approaching enthusiasm, it was ac-
companied by something OF sharpness that
left on the mind of Mr.. Archer, an uncom-
Portable feeling, as il he were blamed for
something. And this had been the W ife's
aspect, even after she had donned her COM
pany altire,and up to the moment when she
had made her appearance among the guests
of the friend, to whose house she brought,
tied up as it were in closely compacted
bundle, her smiles and courresies for public
dispensation.
As be had noticed on many occasions so did
Mr.. Archer notice on this, the remarkable
difference between his wise's home and COM
pany manners-between the treatment of
her husband, and the treatment of other
gentlemen who happened to enter into con-
versation with her, or offer auy polite stten-
tion. The answer to their words always
vent forth from her lips wrea he'd with
smiles and eyes sparkling with pleasures;to
his words, from cold, placid mouth, and
with half Indifferent or averted glances.
And yet Mrs. Hrcher was q faithful wife in
all her dutiful relations; and in heart fov-
ing wife to her husband. IF smiles did not
play in sunny circles over her countenance,
as if former times, she made the household
smile with order and comfort, arranged aRd
secured by her ever busy hands. Her
thoughts were no wandering truants to
otner and forbidden fields, but home guests;
nor were they busy for herself, but for the
children in whom her own life was bound
I'd. Il was not that love for her husband
had grown dull-answering not as a mirror
answereth the face-that she did not meet
his word and attention with smiling glances.
ddQ ene not given ucI Hcoit Whcu ohc gave
him her hand-had she not promised to be
a faithful wife!-Was she not true to all
her relations! What more was required OF
her! 1t never entered her thoughts that
her husband was weak enough to desire a
daily repetition of the love glances with
which, in the season of young loves ardor,
her eyes were ever beaming when they
turned upon his countenance.
And yet even 30. Ii was because he hoped
to live all his after life in the warmth o.
those glances, that be had wooed and won
her in the bright days of her young woman.
hood. And when he saw the light growing
daily DINNER, and felt It's genial warmth
diminishing. shadow fell upon his spirit
Very kind, very attentive the husband re.
!, mained, but the wife became aware of a Ger.
tain coldness towards herself that was fal
from being as pleasant as the lcve-like man
ner with which he had formerly treated her
and many times she sighed for the tone:
and glsnces she saw him give to othel
ladies, and he sighed fof like tokens of in
terest from herself. Both were in error,ant
both in certain sense TO blame.
b On the evening referred to, the contras
between the manner OF his wife to himsel
and to other men who showed his little al
tentions, was felt with more than usual dis
tiuctness by Mr.. Archer. He was not zeal