“If they did,” said Abel, “I am very glad they have turned them over to the other sex since, as they are worn in the number which the present fashion requires.  I should think they would be very uncomfortable.  But, Arthur, I heard such a good story the other day, about Lawyer Page.  He fights bravely with his tongue for other people’s rights, but he daren’t say his soul’s his own before his wife.  Well, when that affair came out about Morton’s whipping his wife, as he was going to the Courthouse, Page said to old Captain Caldwell, ’Do you know, captain, that before all the facts were out in this case about Morton, they actually had it in every direction that it was I who had whipped my wife.’  ‘Now Page,’ said the old captain, ’you know that’s no such thing; for every body in New Haven is well aware that when there was any flogging going on in the matrimonial line, in your house, it was you that came off the worst.’  Page did not say a word.”

“I am glad I am not yoked with one of your New Haven belles, if turning a Jerry Sneak is to be the consequence,” said Arthur.

“This marrying is a terrible necessity, Arthur,” said Abel.  “I don’t know how I’ll be supported under it when my time comes; but after all, I think the women get the worst of it.  There were not two prettier girls in New Haven than my sisters.  Julia, who has been married some eight or nine years, was really beautiful, and so animated and cheerful; now she has that wife-like look of care, forever on her countenance.  Her husband is always reproaching her that that little dare devil of a son of hers does not keep his clothes clean.  The other evening I was at their house, and they were having a little matrimonial discussion about it.  It seems little Charlie had been picked up out of the mud in the afternoon, and brought in in such a condition, that it was sometime before he could be identified.  After being immersed in a bathing tub it was ascertained that he had not a clean suit of clothes; so the young gentleman was confined to his chamber for the rest of the evening, in a night gown.  This my brother-in-law considered a great hardship, and they were talking the matter over when I went in.

“‘Why don’t you make the boy clothes enough, Julia?’ said he.

“‘I am forever making and forever mending,’ said Julia; ’but it is impossible to keep that young one clean.  He had twelve pairs of pantaloons in the wash last week, and the girl was sick, and I had to iron them myself.  I guess if you had all the trouble I have with him, you would put him to bed and make him stay there a week.’

“‘I tell you what it is, good people,’ said I, ’when I go courting I intend to ask the lady in the first place if she likes to make boys’ clothes.  If she says No, I shan’t have her, no matter what other recommendations she may possess.’

“‘She’ll be sure to give you the mitten for your impudence,’ said Julia.  Then, there is my pretty sister Harriet, quilting quilts, trimming nightcaps, and spoiling her bright eyes making her wedding-clothes; after a while she’ll be undergoing some of the troubles of the married state, which will lengthen her face.  The men get the best of it, decidedly; for they have not all the petty annoyances a woman must encounter.  What do you think about it, Arthur?”