Atlanta semi-weekly journal. (Atlanta, Ga.) 1898-1920, 1902-01-13

her husband, that social mOnStroSlty, the
bachelor will never understand, unless he
has some kind friend like Jones, to tell
| him.
Poor Jones! He played tag with luck
! for ten years-he was 1T all the time
and when he finally married. he surren-
dered himself into the arms of loving
wife and agreed TO live in a real house
| instead of at his club, in much the same
spirit that a gambler walks around his
chair when the cards are against him.
Jones was looking for a change of luck.
He got 1t! He's had 1t for four years. He
can't walk around his chair again, and
he knows it, He is on the lane that
knows no turning. He is in the narrow
path and he will be there until the end OF
the chapter.
When Jones first announced his choice
for a wife every one told him that she
was a remarkabl fine girl. Well she was.
but that is four years back in the past
tense. He agreed with them thoroughly.
He thought she was the-but what's the
use, we all know what he thought. Any
way before his final reconciliation of what
had until then been happiness to him, he
would stay up late at night in order to
have more time in which to congratulate
himself and wonder at his good fortune.
But no man knows whether his money
is good until he tries to spend II, ana no
man knows who he has married until It's
too late to regret it,
Jones doesn't think as kindly of Cupid
now as he did on the day that the mis-
chievous youngster sent a quivering Dart
| into the most vital portion of his anato-
| nv. But he does think much more kind
| ly of hard horse sense, and he declares
| on his oath as a husband and father
| that one healthy brain cell filled with
Ia MO a dozen CuDIdS
with all their heartaches and all their
| arrows When the poor fellow married he
hadn't the remotest idea that his wife
| was going to have ideas as well as chill
dren, and did not suspect that he would
| have the ideas tried on him much as the
| children stood TO have their clothes fitted
| upon them. He was mistaken, and sew
eraI days ago. he dropped into the club
he is a rare visitor now. but Tetains his
membership for a rainy day-and there,
| over a beefsteak and highball, told few
chosen spirits of his former days the con-
| idential story of righted wrongs and the
death of new ideas about life in one mans
| home.
For almost a year the confding Jones
| related, his life as a home possessor and
| husband had been an uninterrupted rip
! ping of delight. Some time after the first
| baby came It was that the first idea put
in lis appearance. His wife took up palm
| istry.
''Merely TO divert my mind, dear" she
| said, but Jones soon found that as he
| was the .onlX subject for night sittings,
| he had to give up his cigar and his paper,
| while his wife studied the lines of his
! hand. During the day she practiced upon
| the cook and the baby, and at night she
| was not only prepared to tell him the sto-
! ries of their lives but sought his own
| dark secrets in the hand that fed her.
II have lines in my feet, too" said
| Jones one night in the bitterness of his
| desperation.
"Simpletoni" she said. curtly and threw
his hand from her. severely cracking his
knuckles upon the marble top of nearby
| table. s.
1 Palmistry passed, and she took up psy-
chology which, to the unfortunate Jones.
was a science that consisted in bullying
/ husbands to sit in Straight-backe chairs
! and getting unpleasahtly angry with them
| when they refused to announce themselves
| hypnotized
The lecture fever struck her and Jones
/ caught severe colds in badly heated halls
/ where long-haired idiots talked about
| things Jones cared nothing about and
about which, he was convinced, the lee
/ turers knew only enough to make the wo-
men say Divine and Exquisite. and
clasp their hands in an endeavor to make
each other realize how thoroughly they
| understood Jones did not understand, al
| though he was afraid to say so. and Sc
| cretly he rejoiced in his inability.
Jones carried his 225 pounds through all
1 these troubles without losing an ounce
| nothing except hunger will ever make
| Jones thin-and ii was only when the
| ideas of his wife selected those said
/ pounds as an enemy that the spirit of the
man rose up in revolt.
| The beginning of the end was the ten
mis-" idea One of the numerous periodi-
4 g. al
/ vice to wives about the management OF
| husbands, cooks, babies, butchers and
other things both animate and inanimate
| connected with households said that there
was nothing so good for a fat pater famil-
/ ias as a rousng game of tennis from To
| o'clock, both a. m. and p. m. An unklnd
| fate, of course, could not decree other
wise than that the wife of the poor, fat
Jones should see IT,
my dear" said his wife so sweetly as
to arouse suspicion at the breakfast table
/ one morning Ibid you ever play tennis.
Now, Jones had thrashed this matter
/ out thoroughly with numerous friends
who manifested deep interest in his en-
bonpoint.
mo, and 1 don't want to-" he said bru-
tally.
Now. It is no use just simply will
not / think it is foolish and silly and I
will not be idiot enough to make spec
| tacle of myself by chasing a two-inch
| ball over a ten acre field. Pll-Tll-."
| Goodness, there is no use getting an
CRY about it," she said. who asked you
TO play any way?"
of course, I'm the end Jones bought the
tennis set. He sent it out the same day
and the next morning. he was on the
| court. very hot, very angry. very hungry,
and very much out of breath. After sew
/ eral days he was beginning to like the
| game and there is no telling how the
matter would have ended had he not slip
| ped on a pebble and sat down. barking his
| skin on a post, tearing a new pair of
| trousers, jamming the lighted end of a
| cigar into his mouth far enough to burn
| his lips and swallow some ashes and
| scratching his face on the sand.
That same night disreputao.e man of
| the neighborhood received 81 for commit
| ting the crime of larceny from the wood
| shed. and the next morning the Jones ten
mis- set was missing
After this she became convinced that
the only way to keep the Jones family in
| health was TO have each mem
| Der take cold bath every
morning He stopped this by going on
his vacation month earlier than he had
| intended but when he returned to his
home she had acquired the walking habit
and took him and his 225 pounds on cross
| country trots until finally he baked one
| day in the woods and after sitting down
II 49,