New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1875-07-16


no opportunity to prove the depth of their
loyalty; in countless lives it never finds
louder expression than daily service, cooking,
sewing. the rearing of children, trivial helps,
modesties, forbearances, tendernesses offered
hourly for life long, but to which no thought
or notice is given by her who gives or him
who takes.
There are of course, you tell Yourself unfOr-
tvnate exceptions to this calm unjostled state
Of married life. There is, for instance,
Waugh's wife, whose pew is next yours in
church. waugh is never in it he takes Sun
day to bring up his foreign correspondence
You knew him when he was light-hearted
young fellow on the farm near Oldtown, caring
for nothing but "Anne and the boy" ana
how to make life wholesomer and cheerfuller
for them. He is a gaunt, specialized Old man
now, hair and eyes and skin of a like washed
ont, boodlcss color Waugh &.SOn are among
the solidcst importers on Whte-st. The old
man is down at the office hours before his
clerks, and at night he receives mon on bust
ness A generation ago his wife fell out OF
her place to him and became piece of furni-
turc in his house. He does not know what to
do with his money, it gathers and heaps itself
and soul went down into it long ago. Nobody
but his wife could hope to find in this mummy
the hearty, affectonatc lad whom she loved
and married. But she does hope it, 1t is that
oil Charley" whom she clings to and watches
for, and who, she believes, wilcOme back to her
ut last from this chase of greed in which he
has lost health and youth and character-every-
thing but one womans love.
There is too, that pretty faded little Mrs.
Hicks who sits opposite to you at the board
ing house table, and has no eyes nor thought
for anything but that very pug-nosed, disa-
grceable schOol-bOy at her side. Young Ned
is the image of his father, and that is why she
worshps him. Everybody knows where old
Ned is, and she knows it, though she tells us
every day that he &" is in Europe for the firm.'
She used to creep down the street at night last
Winter and stand opposite certain house on
Thirty -fOurth-st to see him come out with
woman, Qovelier than she was in her freshest
prince and drive Off with her to opera and ball,
and she would stretch out her arms after him
and pray to God to bring him back to her, and
believed too, that lie wOuld do il.
Or-tO go down to what you choose to call
the lower classes, where life is of course, you
think, barred of all romance and delicacy OF
scntimcnt-therc is your washerwOman, OF
whom you remember vaguely to have heard
she had drunken husband. You met the
woman one day, too, and observed what pa
tent face she had, and that she was too thin
and bent to undertake such heavy work. But
that told you nothing of the commonplace story
of a comfortable, pleasant home to which her
husband brought her. or of how they lost 1t
and came to live in the cellar of 4 tenement
house near by. She remembers it every day she
remembers the handsome sturdy young carpen-
ter who used to come whistling home, and all the
love and care which he gave her then. There
is not a loving word of that old time forgot
ten. How else could she pass over the years
of misery and cruelty which she and her chill
dren have borne from the blOated, stupid
wretch who lies there, and not hate and lOathe
him for them She does not hate him. she
i, tenderer, more gentle with him than she
was in those first days. She works for him
like any slave brings him out of the gin
shop, trusts in him, believes in him still,
thinks that he will come back to her again, as
he once was.
Surely there are soitudcs into which men go
down more terrible than any Polar Sea. and
women who stand on the bank rs faithful as
she who sent ont costly ships to bring back
her beloved again. Surely, too, it is time that
we Americans understood that this virtue and
sanctity of married life is not matter for
rare dramatic exhibition, but the solid founda-
ton of our strength and hope as people. Let
us have no more Sush or tampering with it by
so-called friendship. 1t is plant best let
alone to find its own healthy growth; or to
change the figure, it is the salt just now OF
our social lfc--which needs salt And if it lose
its SAVIOR. that life is thenceforth fit for nothing
but to be trampled under foot of men.