[Illustration]
Johnnie Lord, the son of Mr. Jeremy Lord, aged fourteen, was spending
the afternoon with one of his young friends, and his stay was prolonged
into the evening, during which some gentlemen--friends of the
family--dropped in.
The boys withdrew into the recess of the bay-window, while the men
chatted sociably together.
The two boys kept their ears open, as boys will, and, taking their cue
from the sentiments expressed by their elders, endorsed one or the
other, as they happened to agree with them.
“Gentlemen, will you smoke?” asked Mr. Benedict, the host. A
simultaneous, “thank you,” went around, and a smile of satisfaction
lighted every face but one. He was not gloomy or a drawback on the
others, but his smile was not one of assent. A box of costly and
fragrant (?) cigars was soon forthcoming.
“Fine cigar,” said one, as he held it to his nose before lighting it.
“What, Linton, you don’t smoke?”
“I’m happy to say I do not,” was the firm rejoinder.
“Well, now, you look like a smoking man, jolly, care free, and all
that. I’m quite surprised,” said another.
“We are hardly doing right to smoke in the parlor, are we?” asked a
red-faced man, puffing away heartily. “I yield that much to my wife’s
dislike of the weed. She makes a great ado about the curtains, you
know.”
“For my part, that’s a matter I don’t trouble myself about,” said the
host, broadly. “There’s no room in this house too good for me and
my friends to smoke in. My wife has always understood that, and she
yields, of course.”
“But you don’t know how it chokes her,” said young Hal Benedict. “Yes,
indeed, it gets all through the house, you know, and she almost always
goes into Aunt Nellie’s, when there are two or three smoking. There she
goes, now,” he added, as the front door shut.
[Illustration: “_It’s driving her out of her house_”]
“Why, it’s absolutely driving her out of her house, isn’t it?”
whispered Johnnie Lord, from his nook. “Too bad!”
“Why don’t you smoke, Linton?” queried one of the party. “’Fraid of it?
Given it up lately? Of course it doesn’t agree with some constitutions.”
“Well, if you want to know why I don’t smoke, friend Jay,” was the
answer, “I will tell you; I respect my wife too much.”
“Why, you don’t mean--” stammered his questioner.
“I mean simply what I said. When I was married, I had the habit of
smoking cigars. But I saw that the smoke annoyed her, though she
behaved with the utmost good taste and forbearance. Seeing this, I cut
down my cigars so as to smoke only when going to and returning from
business.
“But even then, I considered what my presence must be to a delicate,
sensitive woman, with my breath and clothes saturated with the odor,
and I began to be disgusted with myself, so that I finally dropped the
habit, and I can’t say I’m sorry.”
“I shouldn’t be, I know,” said another, admiringly. “I’m candid enough
to own it, and I think your wife ought to be very much obliged to you.”
“On the contrary, it is I who ought to be obliged to my wife,” said Mr.
Linton, while the host smoked on in silence, very red in the face, and
evidently wincing under the reproof that was not meant.
“I say, Linton is a perfect gentleman,” whispered young Benedict.
“He’s splendid,” supplemented Johnnie Lord, who was thinking his own
thoughts; but the smoke was really getting too much for him, and
presently he took his leave.
The next day Johnnie Lord was thoughtful; so quiet, indeed, that
everybody noticed it. In the evening, when his father lighted his pipe,
with its strong tobacco, Johnnie seemed to be on thorns.
“I can’t think that you don’t respect mother,” he blurted out, and then
his face grew scarlet.
“What do you mean?” asked his father in a severe voice. “I say, what do
you mean, sir?”
“Because mother hates the smoke so; because it gets into the curtains
and carpet--and--and--because I heard Mr. Linton say last night, that
he did not smoke because he respected his wife too much.”
“Pshaw! Your mother doesn’t mind my smoking--do you mother?” he asked,
jocularly, as his wife entered the room.
“Well--I--I used to, rather more than I do now. One can get accustomed
to anything, I suppose, so I go on the principle that what can’t be
cured must be endured.”
“Nonsense! you know I could stop to-morrow if I wanted to,” he laughed.
“But you won’t want to,” she said, softly.
Now I don’t know whether Johnnie’s father gave up the weed. Most likely
not; but if you want to see what really came of it, I will give you a
peep at the following paper, written some years ago, and which happens
to be in my possession.
“_I John Lord, of sound mind, do make, this first day of January, the
following resolutions, which I pray God I may keep_:--
“_FIRST: I will not get married until I own a house._
“_SECOND: I will never swear, because it is silly, as well as wicked._
“_THIRD: I will never smoke, and so make myself disagreeable to
everybody who comes near me, and I will always keep these words as my
motto after I am married_:--
“_‘I don’t smoke because I respect my wife.’ Mr. Linton said that,
and I will never forget it._”
And Johnnie kept his word like a hero.