"Anima mia," [Soul of mine]--said the doctor, tenderly, "I hold the cloak, the umbrella, and the pipe as the sole relics that remain to me of my native country.

Respect and spare them." Mrs.Riccabocca was touched, and had the good sense to perceive that man, let him be ever so much married, retains certain signs of his ancient independence,--certain tokens of his old identity, which a wife, the most despotic, will do well to concede.

She conceded the cloak, she submitted to the umbrella, she overcame her abhorrence of the pipe.
After all, considering the natural villany of our sex, she confessed to herself that she might have been worse off.

But through all the calm and cheerfulness of Riccabocca, a nervous perturbation was sufficiently perceptible; it commenced after the second week of marriage; it went on increasing, till one bright sunny afternoon, as he was standing on his terrace, gazing down upon the road, at which Jackeymo was placed, lo, a stage-coach stopped! The doctor made a bound, and put both hands to his heart as if he had been shot; he then leaped over the balustrade, and his wife from her window beheld him flying down the hill, with his long hair streaming in the wind, till the trees hid him from her sight.
"Ah," thought she, with a natural pang of conjugal jealousy, "henceforth I am only second in his home.

He has gone to welcome his child!" And at that reflection Mrs.Riccabocca shed tears.
But so naturally amiable was she, that she hastened to curb her emotion, and efface as well as she could the trace of a stepmother's grief.