So far as possible, let all women dress beautifully:  so God dresses the meadows and the mountains.  Let them wear pearls and diamonds if they can afford it:  God has hung round the neck of his world strings of diamonds, and braided the black locks of the storm with bright ribbons of rainbow.  Especially before and right after breakfast, ere they expect to be seen of the world, let them look neat and attractive for the family’s sake.  One of the most hideous sights is a slovenly woman at the breakfast table.  Let woman adorn herself.  Let her speak on platforms so far as she may have time and ability to do so.  But let not mothers imagine that there is any new way of successfully training children, or of escaping the old-time self-denial and continuous painstaking.

Let this be the commencement of the law suit: 

  Old cradle
  versus
  patented self-rocker.

Attorneys for plaintiff—­all the cherished memories of the past.

Attorneys for the defendant—­all the humbugs of the present.

For jury—­the good sense of all Christendom.

Crier, open the court and let the jury be empaneled.

CHAPTER XVI.

A horse’s letter.

[Translated for the tea-table.]

  Brooklyn Livery Stables,
  January 20, 1874.

My dear Gentlemen and Ladies:  I am aware that this is the first time a horse has ever taken upon himself to address any member of the human family.  True, a second cousin of our household once addressed Balaam, but his voice for public speaking was so poor that he got unmercifully whacked, and never tried it again.  We have endured in silence all the outrages of many thousands of years, but feel it now time to make remonstrance.  Recent attentions have made us aware of our worth.  During the epizooetic epidemic we had at our stables innumerable calls from doctors and judges and clergymen.  Everybody asked about our health.  Groomsmen bathed our throats, and sat up with us nights, and furnished us pocket-handkerchiefs.  For the first time in years we had quiet Sundays.  We overheard a conversation that made us think that the commerce and the fashion of the world waited the news from the stable.  Telegraphs announced our condition across the land and under the sea, and we came to believe that this world was originally made for the horse, and man for his groom.

But things are going back again to where they were.  Yesterday I was driven fifteen miles, jerked in the mouth, struck on the back, watered when I was too warm; and instead of the six quarts of oats that my driver ordered for me, I got two.  Last week I was driven to a wedding, and I heard music and quick feet and laughter that made the chandeliers rattle, while I stood unblanketed in the cold.  Sometimes the doctor hires me, and I stand at twenty