This brings me to the reason of all this long history.  I have always looked upon marriage without love as nothing more or less than legalized vice.  I think you, who are so intrinsically a man of the world, will have imbibed the (so-called) sensible and popular views upon such subjects, and will at once coincide with me that in such a union as ours—­a literal mariage de convenance on both sides—­my ideas are not unwise.  Since upon you will henceforth depend my maintenance (as I of course understand that a wife who worked for her own support would be a disgrace to you:  indeed, I doubt whether the having married a girl who has already done so is not a cause of shame), I ask that now, when Mrs. Keller is about to leave me, and my arrangements as your wife must be finally made—­when, in fact, her giving up her room necessitates my coming to yours, her leaving compelling me either to go with her, or come, as of course I must, to you—­we may have a definite understanding as to our future relations.

You have been kind enough to approve of the little I have been able to do for you since our marriage—­to say to Mrs. Keller you did not know what it was to be taken care of in sickness; and to myself you have more than once laughingly spoken of a wife as a good institution, adding, that had you known how comfortable it was to have some one about you to think of and care for you, you would have invested in the article before; and so on.  I am glad of this:  I am pleased that my society has not proved repugnant to you; for since it has been no annoyance in its first trial, I think we can manage that it shall not be so in the future.  I would ask, as an especial piece of mercy to “your handmaiden,” that you will grant her some favors at the outset of our somewhat tangled fate.  Please let me be your sister.  It is for your well-being the world should know me as your wife, and, the Lord helping me, I will be a willing, faithful helpmeet to you, caring most for your comfort and happiness, spending and being spent in your service; never demanding or desiring your attention, except so much as is due me in outward seeming; interfering with none of your pleasures or pursuits, or thrusting my needs or feelings never before you.  I have no expectation of winning your love:  it has been an understood thing from the first—­that is something neither expects from the other—­therefore any show of caressing fondness upon your part would be quite out of keeping with our position.  I have watched with some amusement, and a little pain that you should imagine it requisite, your attempts at petting me during these last two weeks.  Poor, helpless man! it was a little hard to have to pretend an interest and tenderness you did not feel.  Will you let this cease, with every other demonstration of affection, in our private relations?