7.  No, I’m not a vindictive woman, Mr. Caudle:  nobody ever called me that but you.  What do you say?  Nobody ever knew so much of me?  That’s nothing at all to do with it.  Ha!  I would n’t have your aggravating temper, Caudle, for mines of gold.  It’s a good thing I’m not as worrying as you are, or a nice house there’d be between us.  I only wish you’d had a wife that would have talked to you!  Then you’d have known the difference.  But you impose upon me because, like a poor fool, I say nothing.  I should be ashamed of myself, Caudle.

8.  And a pretty example you set as a father!  You’ll make your boys as bad as yourself.  Talking as you did all breakfast time about your buttons! and of a Sunday morning, too!  And you call yourself a Christian!  I should like to know what your boys will say of you when they grow up!  And all about a paltry button off one of your wristbands!  A decent man would n’t have mentioned it.  Why don’t I hold my tongue?  Because I won’t hold my tongue.  I’m to have my peace of mind destroyed—­I ’m to be worried into my grave for a miserable shirt button, and I’m to hold my tongue!  Oh! but that’s just like you men!

9.  But I know what I’ll do for the future.  Every button you have may drop off, and I won’t so much as put a thread to ’em.  And I should like to know what you’ll do then!  Oh, you must get somebody else to sew ’em, must you?  That’s a pretty threat for a husband to hold out to his wife!  And to such a wife as I’ve been, too:  such a slave to your buttons, as I may say.  Somebody else to sew ’em’!  No, Caudle, no; not while I’m alive!  When I’m dead—­and, with what I have to bear, there’s no knowing how soon that may be—­when I ’m dead, I say—­oh! what a brute you must be to snore so!

10.  You’re not snoring?  Ha! that’s what you always say; but that’s nothing to do with it.  You must get somebody else to sew ’em, must you?  Ha!  I should n’t wonder.  Oh, no!  I should be surprised at nothing now!  Nothing at all!  It’s what people have always told me it would come to; and now the buttons have opened my eyes!  But the whole world shall know of your cruelty, Mr. Caudle.  After the wife I’ve been to you.  Caudle, you’ve a heart like a hearthstone, you have!

Definitions.—­5.  Ag’gra-vat-ing, provoking, irritating. 6.  Sink’ing, failing in strength. 7.  Vin-dic’tive, revengeful. 8.  Pal’try, mean, contemptible.

XLVI.  THE VILLAGE BLACKSMITH.

1.  Under a spreading chestnut tree
     The village smithy stands;
   The smith, a mighty man is he,
     With large and sinewy hands;
   And the muscles of his brawny arms
     Are strong as iron bands.

2.  His hair is crisp, and black, and long,
     His face is like the tan;
   His brow is wet with honest sweat,
     He earns whate’er he can,
   And looks the whole world in the face,
     For he owes not any man.