DIVIDING UP.

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume VI, Issue 627, 15 February 1879, Page 2

DIVIDING UP.

A man of forty-five having a wooden leg and the look of one who had suffered long with the toothache, sat down m the chair vacated by a boy, and after a smile of encouragement began : tmi" ** matters don>t niend pretty soon 1 11 either murder her or take my own life !" " Domestic trouble, I suppose 1" queried Bijah. " That's it sir, and I'm getting desperate. I left home thinking I'd jump from the dock but I happened to think of you and so I thought I'd ask advice." " Is the bread heavy ?" " Blast the bread ! I can stand heavy bread, sloppy tea, raw meat and halfcooked potatoes, but I can't nor won't stand the infernal whining, complaining and jawing around !" " Fellow traveller along the tow-path of Time's broad-guage canal, I think I see the pint. You have been married about two years V* . "Not quite." " You are fifteen years older than your wife ?" "Yes— eighteen." " You have a wooden leg and she— she " She hasn't, but I wish she had two of 'em." " She likes good clothes ?" "You bet!" " She likes the mad whirl of society— sixteen dollar bonnets— reserved seats at ' the opera — eight dollar boots — forty but- J tons kid gloves and trains on her dresses 1" " She does— that's her to the dot!" exclaimed the husband 1 ' And you prefer your horne — evening fire — newspaper — snow apples — game of checkers— glass of cider— cat on the hearth, and so on V " That'a the sort o' man I am, sir and she harasses me to death. She's on the trot all day, and on the gad all the evening, and if I remonstrate she says I want to make a slave and a prisoner of her." " Don't you go along with her to the theatre and parties ?" " I used to, but for the last year she's awful particular about my wooden legsays the public will think I was shot while stealing chickens." "Does, eh? And you sit at home and keep your heels warm by the cookstove while she gallivants ? " ' ' The same, sir ; and now what shall Ido about it ; Something has got to be did, and that right off. I'll be hanged to Davy Crockett, if I put up with it another day ! You are an older man than I am and you have had three wives to my one, and I'll do just as you say about it." " Fellow-man, you have been , wrong from the beginning," slowly answered Bijah, as he looked out of the wiudow m a weary way." The man who marries a woman only half his age is a d. f. (deceived fried-cake) at the atart. Youth may reverence old age, but love isn't reverence. Youth and old age don't like their tatUrs cooked the same way, and the man who says they do is a forger. They don't see alike, and it's a cat-and-dog life. Then again, you have a wooden leg, and ycu should have a woman with a glass eye or a broken nose as an offset. In that case neither I party has anything to twit the other about. If I was to marry again, baldheaded as I am, I should look for a lady wearing NO. 10 gloves and No. 9 shoes as an offset. Do you love your wife ? " •' Well, to be honest about it, I don't think either of us are dying of love." " Then my friend, you go home and have a candid talk, divide up the things, and part good friends. Give her the largest half, throw m some small change, and see that she gets safe home to her mother. By-and-by you can quietly secure a bill of divorce, get on some store clothes, and look out for a woman of fifty, who has the rheumatics so that she can't gad. " " That's honest, is it ?" " Honest, Injun. If you can't live happy togher, don't hesitate to live happy apart. No use m any scandal or hard words, but divide up and call it a bad mistake. This killing one's self on account of domestic troubles is all." "That's so, and I'll walk straight home and begin the dividing up business. Thank you, Bijah, may your feet stop growing as a reward for this." When he had deparbed Bijah took a short cut through the alleys, and presently gained a position from whence he could view the house where the man lived. Developments did not tarry. The husband had not been m the house five minutes before he was suddenly rushed out again, hat and cane flying, and his share of the things consisting of three flat-irons, a kettle, and two bricks, over-took him before he could dodge. I* So young and so artless | " mused Bijah, as he turned away ; "and yet that last brick thumped him between the shoulder just as purty as if I'd thrown it myself."