voracious appetite for amusements of all kinds
exhibited by madame since her marriage. The
friends of both husband and wife did, as the
Hints on Etiquette demanded of them,
provide a certain amount of evening recreation
for our young couple; reunions at which
there was something done in the way of card-
playing, of games, of music, of conversation
—the company separating at an early hour,
after partaking of sundry cakes and innocent
beverages. But this sort of dissipation was
not enough for our young lady. There is a
theatre of considerable pretensions at
Marseilles, and madame demanded (attention is
requested to the word) to be frequently escorted
by her husband to that place of entertainment,
the demand not to be refused, on pain of—
alas! an amount of pouting wich drove the
unfortunate Pierre to the verge of distraction.
And then madame's tantrums were of such a
peculiar sort! In the midst of her sulks, or
when her husband had got to be panic-stricken,
she would burst out suddenly into a fit of
laughing, at which the honest man was more
frightened than ever.

One day Monsieur Pierre ventured on a mild
remonstrance. He had been looking into his
accounts, and had discovered that the goings out
and the comings in were not harmonious. There
were discrepancies. Laxity in the housekeeping
arrangements, continual visits to the theatre,
carriage-hire, which such visits rendered
indispensable—these, and the ravishing toilets of
madame, were running away with the limited
income of our friend, after a fashion which
terrified Monsieur Pierre not a little. In fact,
he was lashed up at last to such desperation,
that speech, ay, even though it should lead
to unpleasantness, was a relief which must be
had.

"Look here, cherished one," he began. "I
have been looking into money matters, and I
find that we are spending too much. We must
become more economical."

"More economical!" echoed the lady. "Why,
we spend nothing as it is."

"There will soon be nothing to spend," re-
plied Monsieur Grandal. "You never—never
go to market now. Before you were mar-
ried——"

"Before I was married, monsieur, it was
different. A young girl is one person, and a
married lady is altogether another. I am not
going to compromise myself by haggling in the
market now, I can tell you."

"Why, Eugénie," groaned her husband, in
simple consternation, "is this you?"

"Silence, sir!" screamed the lady; and then
she went off into hysterics, but whether of tears
or laughter, poor Monsieur Pierre could not
make out. So he gave it up, and went away out
of the house; but his back was hardly turned,
before madame jumped up from her sofa, and
running across to where a photograph of her
husband hung against the wall, began to kiss the
portrait with all her might. Then she went into
the bedroom and kissed his robe-de-chambre, and
even his slippers, and " Oh, my darling, my
darling," she cried, " I can't, indeed—I can't keep
it up much longer, though I have promised all
the young girls of our quarter to take this
terrible vengeance."

Pierre wandered about for a time disconsolate,
and then he thought that he would go
back. It must have been a fit of momentary
irritability. He knew Eugénie better than to
suppose that she was really what she appeared
to be now.

But when he got home full of intentions of
reconciliation, there was nobody to be reconciled
to. " Madame had gone out," the bonne said.
"She had gone out with a gentleman—with
Lieutenant Lemorier, in fact. She had not
mentioned when she should return."

To our unfortunate friend this intelligence was
wormwood. He had gone back to his home
with much to say. He wanted to have some
explanation. It was impossible to rest, so he got
up and went out again, fretting and chafing.
"To have gone out with that hateful fellow, too
—it was intolerable." Thus he wandered about
the town. His expression of countenance was
not a joyous one probably. Certain members of
the Strike saw him, and nudged each other
facetiously. "Our friend does not look happy,"
they said; "he has been taken in. He should
have kept with us." At last, as it got near
dinner-time, Pierre went back to his home.
"She had arrived by this time?" But the
bonne said, "No, madame had not appeared."

We all know what waiting is. Pierre waited
and waited, and fretted and fumed. The servant
came in and proposed dinner, but her master
would not hear of it. By-and-by he went out,
to the abode of his wife's parents. Had they
heard or seen anything of Eugénie?

Nothing.

He came back. It was dark now. Again
the bonne besought him to take food, and again
he refused. Sitting at the window, and looking
out, then getting up and pacing the room,
then to the window again, that was how he
passed the evening.

At last it struck eleven. He would take some
decided steps. As he approached the outer
door, there was a ringing at the bell. He opened
the door himself, and his wife stood before
him.

"Are you going out?" she asked, calmly,
observing that he had his hat on.

"I was going out," answered Pierre. "Where
have you been, Eugénie?" he added, when they
got into the salon.

"I have been at a concert," was the careless
reply.

"In company with Monsieur Lemorier?" was
the next question.

Madame Grandal assented. She did not
add, though, that the sub-lieutenant's married
sister and her husband had also been of the
party.

Grandal was silent for a while. "Eugénie,"
he said at last, " it is time that this ended,
and it must end. What does your conduct