The Morristown gazette. [volume] (Morristown, Tenn.) 1867-1920, 1873-08-20
A sDeII of Single BIessedness.

My.wife has gone away for the
summer and left me in full charge
of the house. I like it; haven't
had such a run of liberty since we
were married. I hope she's having
a good time, for can now exercise
my rights as the head of the family.
Can't do it when she's at home ;
she'll not stand it. She has rules,
and makes everybody about her toe
the mark. But I've got her now,
and am having things my own way.
This morning l came home quite
early. It was ? a. m. I'd been to
the club and got caught in the rain.
For half an hour | couldn't find the
key-hole, which must have got mis-
laid. / felt for it everywhere, and
even got down into the yard and ey-
amined every brick but couldn't find
it. / was in the act Of calling to
my neighbor and asking him who
had carried of my front door, when
I happened to find it and got into
the house.
IN the dark I kicked over a spit
toon, but luckily didn't get any to-
bacco juice on my boots. | hung
my oyercoat and umbrella on a
prong of the chandelier, let them
drip on the parlor carpet, and went
up stairs and turned in with my
boots on. l thought it WASH t worth
while to pull them of, as [ would
have to get up in eight or ten hours
anyhow. If my wife had been at
home she'd have had me looking an
hour for the boot,jack and | would
have lost that amount of rest, which
my system so much needed. Be-
sides she'd have made me give a
full account of myself, which | don t
like to do. I never did believe in
praising myself. It's better to let
others speak Of ones virtues. I can
now wear a shirt a week and its no
body's business. I don't see how I
ever did get along with that woman.
The idea of having to put on a,clean
shirt, black my boots, and brush my
clothes every morning is simply
ridiculous. 1t is a miracle to me
how I ever did it and attended to
my other affairs. l now read the
morning paper without being forced
to see an impatient woman standing
with her dress in one hand. looking
very miserable. and finally telling
me that she's going down town and
wants that paper for a d Any
one, to look at the house now would
know there is no woman about,
everything is SO quiet and comforta-
BILE and handy. If l want to do a
little figuring I don't have to hunt
up a pencil, or pen and ink, but I
just sit down to one OF the tables
and do it with my finger, and there's
nobody to be eternally welding q
dusting brush around my head and
telling me to get out of the way un-
til the house is cleaned up. These
are considerations that every mar
ried man should ponder over. But
when we do ponder and resolve
what good does it do? Not a bit
If these women can't have every
thing just their own way, they swoon
off into Mysteries. AS consequence
we have to pay ffty dollar doctors
bill, and stay in the house all day,
tanning them and promising in the
end that "we may be happy yet
before they show any disposition to
compromise. Our wives are petted
too much. And this reminds me
that mine won't yield to any other
treatment. I undertook to prescribe
a more stringent remedy for her
once, but it threw her into fit more
like the tim-jams than anything I
know Of. She broke every plate in
the house over my head and then 1
had to kiss her before she would
promise not to do it again. That's
what make me say she is set in her
ways.
There, too, are the piano and quit
ar which she kept going from morn
ing until midnight, filing the whole
neighborhood with discordant- sounds
which she called music. Both are as
mute as the bird cage which was va
Gated last week by strategetie
movement of the cat. s
The two hundred pots of flowers
she left me to cultivate I don't think
will produce much of q crop. They
are nearly all ripe now and there's
no sign OF a flower yet. | have wa
tered them twice since she left but
it did no good. / reckon they miss
her and are pining away because she
amt here. In this respect they do
not resemble me to any alarming
extent.
Our kitchen never looked better.
The stove and pipe have assumed a
beautiful red tint, and the pots are
bringing forth q fine crop Of white