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ROMANCE AND REALITY.
71

whom propriety stands for principle,—and this deviation of her friend at first excited surprise, then softened into sorrow, and finally roused into anger—which anger, under the name of opinion, she forthwith set out to vent on the offender, after having bestowed a portion of it on her husband, who encountering her, cold, cloak, and all, had raised her indignation by not being so much astonished as herself, and calmly replying,

"Well, my dear, this said cap—I dare-say she is setting it at your brother."

If there be two things in the world—to use a common domestic expression—enough to provoke a saint, it is, first to have your husband not enter into your feelings—(your feelings sound so much better than your temper)—and, in the second place, laughing at them. Now, Dr. Clarke's not regarding a widow's conduct in leaving off her cap as absolutely immoral, was not very tenable ground, for men are not supposed to know much about such matters; but this allusion to Boyne was a very respectable outlet for resentment.

"Her brother, indeed, to marry such an old woman! She was very much deceived if there were not younger ones who would be