convenience, sensitiveness, tastes, or happiness in those of their children.  Nothing can discharge them from the obligations which they are under to each other.  But if a woman lets herself become shabby, drudgy, and commonplace as a wife, in her efforts to be perfect as a mother, can she expect to retain the consideration that is due to the wife?  Not a man in the world but would rather see his wife tidy, neat, and elegant in her attire, easy and assured in her bearing, intelligent and vivacious in her talk, than the contrary; and if she neglect these things, ought she to be surprised, if he turns to fresh woods and pastures new for the diversion and entertainment which he seeks in vain at home?  This is quaky ground, but I know where I am, and I am not afraid.  I don’t expect men or women to say that they agree with me, but I am right for all that.  Let us bring our common sense to bear on this point, and not be fooled by reiteration.  Cause and effect obtain here as elsewhere.  If you add two and two, the result is four, however much you may try to blink it.  People do not always tell lies, when they are telling what is not the truth; but falsehood is still disastrous.  Men and women think they believe a thousand things which they do not believe; but as long as they think so, it is just as bad as if it were so.  Men talk—­and women listen and echo—­about the overpowering loveliness and charm of a young mother surrounded by her blooming family, ministering to their wants and absorbed in their welfare, self-denying and self-forgetful; and she is lovely and charming; but if this is all, it is little more than the charm and loveliness of a picture.  It is not magnetic and irresistible.  It has the semblance, but not the smell of life.  It is pretty to look at, but it is not vigorous for command.  Her husband will have a certain kind of admiration and love.  Her wish will be law within a certain very limited sphere; but beyond that he will not take her into his counsels and confidence.  A woman must make herself obvious to her husband, or he will drift out beyond her horizon.  She will be to him very nearly what she wills and works to be.  If she adapts herself to her children and does not adapt herself to her husband, he will fall into the arrangement, and the two will fall apart.  I do not mean that they will quarrel, but they will lead separate lives.  They will be no longer husband and wife.  There will be a domestic alliance, but no marriage.  A predominant interest in the same objects binds them together after a fashion; but marriage is something beyond that.  If a woman wishes and purposes to be the friend of her husband,—­if she would be valuable to him, not simply as the nurse of his children and the directress of his household, but as a woman fresh and fair and fascinating, to him intrinsically lovely and attractive, she should make an effort for it.  It is not by any means a thing that comes of itself, or that can be left to itself.  She must read, and observe, and think,