“But who will take care of Atalanta?  Are you going to forsake your cherished books for a curry-comb?”

“Really, Marthe!” exclaimed her husband in an aggrieved tone, “it is incomprehensible that you should have such a total disregard for the delicacy of my constitution,—­especially when you know that the very odor of the stable is abhorrent to my olfactory senses.  Atalanta has quarters provided for her at the Vernon Livery, and one of the grooms has orders to bring the carriage to the door at two o’clock every afternoon.”

“But that will make it very awkward, Horace.  I so often have to use the carriage in the morning.”

“‘Have,’ my dear Marthe, is a word which admits of many substitutions,—­’cannot’ in this case will be a suitable one.  I find it is necessary to resume possession of the reins.  Atalanta is retrograding and is rapidly losing that characteristic of speed which made her name a fitting one.  There is a lack of mastery about a woman’s handling of the ribbons which is quickly detected by horses, especially when they are of more than average intelligence.”

“But, Horace, if Reuben goes, Joanna will go too.  You know she promised her mother she would never leave him.”

“In that event, my dear, you will have an opportunity to become more intimately acquainted with the mysteries of the culinary art,” observed Mr. Everidge cheerfully.  “It will be a splendid chance to evolve that finest of character combinations, Spartan endurance coupled with American progressiveness.”

Mrs. Everidge smiled.  “But what if I do not have the Spartan strength, Horace?”

“That is merely a matter of imagination, my love.  It proves the truth of my theory that necessity develops capacity.  A woman of leisure, for want of suitable mental pabulum, grows to fancy she has every ill that flesh is heir to, whereas, when she is obliged by compelling circumstances to put her muscles into practice, her mind acquires a more healthy tone.  Self-contemplation is a most enervating exercise and involves a tremendous drain on the moral forces.”

“Do you think I waste much time in that way, Horace?” Mrs. Everidge spoke wistfully, and Evadne, forced to be an unwilling listener to the conversation, felt her cheeks grow hot with indignation.

“My dear, I merely refer to the deplorable tendency of your sex.  All you require is moral stamina to tear yourself away from the arms of Morpheus at an earlier hour in the It is a popular illusion, you know, that work performed before sunrise takes less time to accomplish and is better done than later in the day.  My mother used to affirm that she accomplished the work of two days in one when she arose at three a.m., but then my mother was a most exceptional woman,” with which parting thrust Mr. Everidge retired behind the pages of his magazine.