The Seattle post-intelligencer. [volume] (Seattle, Wash. Terr. [Wash.]) 1888-1914, 1897-06-13

Y warn 10 sMzs%1EZ I&EF MATFfy SsE4&t@sA1
| ssirA her, tn frost % baking 3-e. read
/. irg Hzwtsovne o. Seoss aloud ANY az
| co2rag~si him IN st14s visScu Ct mild pleas
/ ure. fScuEh she bad bit little expectation
1 % eyer seeing II realized
Amy isAe1 70 Rad too, but Shakss-
| pears and Milton and Scott had no charm
| for her. Sse Rad even graduated s-orn
/ Tnaeks-zy. or thought she had. IL eoEn-
| rzon with many other persons. she had
/ somehow acquired the sensation OF having
read all the standard books without
| really ever having been through the testi-
Gus process % reading them She had
sasd so many times that she had read
Paradise Lost that she felt Just about
as IL slse had. But to any one who knew
her ~eIi-ArthBr did not a. the tine CO
his maria gs-tte idea OF Amy IAGut Sit
ting down 10 read Milton, or Carlyle o.
Gaeaassy. or Matthew Arnold. or Green.
or even Washington Irving. was too alb
ssIrd to BE- taken seriously The truth Is.
she had never read ten pages OF any one
OF those authors She liked Shelly. and
had rad little OF Keats: bet Swinburne
vas the poet that she dotted upon. The
swooning righteousness of his verse en-
chaEtst her. and his utterly perverted
moral standard was a sauce which sea-
soued long pages OF verses which would
otherwise have contained little to interest
her. Edgar Allan Poe was the only
American author that she cared for she
read principally In French, and books
which Arthur would not have allowed in
his house before his marriage were strewn
freely about hts tables after IL The
truth was. Amy liked author with a
highly stimulated Imagination: and IL 1t
happened to be diseased, why, SO much
the better.
New what shall we read~" said Ar
thur cneeFfGiiy. as he ard his wife sat
In front OF the fire. the second evening af-
ter their return from their wedding jour
Dey. lane Austen. or George Eliot. or
The Autocrat OF the Breakfast Tabie7''
Il don't care. Arthur,-anything
feel rather tired tonight"
MY poor child. Eut il viii rest you TO
hear little reading. III tell you: I'll
pick out something and begin to read it,
and then You can guess what 1t Is"
He went 10 bookcase, took down =
book. opened 1t, and began to read
:" With a single drop OF Ink for a mir
ror. the Egyptian sorcerer undertakes 20
reveal 90 any chance conner far reaching
visions OF the past. That is what an
dertake 20 do for you. reader. With this
drop OF ink at the end o. my pen / VIII
show you the roomy workshop or Mr..
Jonathan Burse. carpenter and builder in
the village Of Hayslope'-Now you know
Arthur said. inierrupting himself. "Of
course the Hayslope' would give il away.
even IL you hadn't remembered Jonathan
Burge. Didn't you always feel sorry for
Mary Burge? Adam was SO disasreeable
to her.
Yes. he was horrid.'' Amy said, won
dering what the book could be. Then she
boldly observed, Adam was a pretty mean
fellow. anyway. / think"
Arthur looked at her TO see II she was
Joking. you don't really mean that. do
you Amy?" he inquired.
NO OF course didn't" Amy rejoined
hurriediy. Go ahead. Arthur
Arthur read very well, and was. natur-
ally. little proud OF the unusual accomp-
ishment. When he finished the first chap
ter, ne paused for a moment for Amy TO
say how much she liked the book and
also perhaps, how well she thought he
read.
That's the stupidest stuff I ever
heard she said, yawning.
Arthur biz his lip: but he was a person
who seldom lost his self control--not Of
ten enough, perhaps.
You're tired. Amy" he said risins and
s,roking her hair. You ought TO go to
bed dear. We can go on with the book
tomorrow night"
''Oh, no. I'm not especially tired" Amy
replied coolly. I'm only bored with that
book I'll tell you what wen do. You
sit and read that, and I'll run upstairs
and get 'Une Femme Then well both be
happy"
Again Arthur kept his temper. Every
WE'LL he replied and. returning to his
seat. began TO read TO himself Amy
brought her novel down stairs. and there
for a couple OF hours they sat; Arthur
reading a book describing the manifest OF
men, Amy a work whose title should
have been A Woman, Little as You Might
Think II.
And so ended the reading aloud that poor
Arthur had imagined as one OF the pleas
ATTEST parts OF his married life. Hundreds
OF stories. poems, plays. and histories. all
narrowed down in an instant TO one short
CHAPTER in a novel, THE way OF the
world" Arthur said bitterly TO himself.
He was perfectly right. II is the way OF
the world that IL you marry a woman
who does not like reading aloud. you must
read by yourself. There were plenty OF
women in Hartford who liked reading
aloud Why did not Arthur marry one
OF thems
CTo be- continued1