The habits of Mr. Douglass, on the contrary, did not change.  He was as orderly as before, and dressed with the same regard to neatness.  He never appeared at the breakfast-table in the morning without being shaved; nor did he lounge about in the evening in his shirt-sleeves.  The slovenly habits into which Cora had fallen annoyed him seriously; and still more so, when her carelessness about her appearance began to manifest itself abroad as well as at home.  When he hinted any thing on the subject, she did not hesitate to reply, in a jesting manner, that her fortune was made, and she need not trouble herself any longer about how she looked.

Douglass did not feel very much complimented; but as he had his share of good sense, he saw that to assume a cold and offended manner would do no good.

“If your fortune is made, so is mine,” he replied on one occasion, quite coolly and indifferently.  Next morning he made his appearance at the breakfast table with a beard of twenty-four hours’ growth.

“You haven’t shaved this morning, dear,” said Cora, to whose eyes the dirty-looking face of her husband was particularly unpleasant.

“No,” he replied, carelessly.  “It’s a serious trouble to shave every day.”

“But you look so much better with a cleanly-shaved face.”

“Looks are nothing—­ease and comfort every thing,” said Douglass.

“But common decency, Edward.”

“I see nothing indecent in a long beard,” replied the husband.

Still Cora argued, but in vain.  Her husband went off to his business with his unshaven face.

“I don’t know whether to shave or not,” said Douglass next morning, running his hand over his rough face, upon which was a beard of forty-eight hours’ growth.  His wife had hastily thrown on a wrapper, and, with slip-shod feet and head like a mop, was lounging in a large rocking-chair, awaiting the breakfast-bell.

“For mercy’s sake, Edward, don’t go any longer with that shockingly dirty face,” spoke up Cora.  “If you knew how dreadfully you look!”

“Looks are nothing,” replied Edward, stroking his beard.

“Why, what’s come over you all at once?”

“Nothing; only it’s such a trouble to shave every day.”

“But you didn’t shave yesterday.”

“I know; I am just as well off to-day as if I had.  So much saved, at any rate.”

But Cora urged the matter, and her husband finally yielded, and mowed down the luxuriant growth of beard.

“How much better you do look!” said the young wife.  “Now don’t go another day without shaving.”

“But why should I take so much trouble about mere looks?  I’m just as good with a long beard as with a short one.  It’s a great deal of trouble to shave every day.  You can love me just as well; and why need I care about what others say or think?”

On the following morning, Douglass appeared not only with a long beard, but with a bosom and collar that were both soiled and rumpled.