I
The birth, growth and development of Edith Beckett was in the nature
of a prolonged prelude to the life of Edith Greene.
She was brought up with but one ideal: to be a good wife and mother,
and to set about being the first, at least, at as early an age as
possible. This concentration on a single aim amply repaid itself.
When Edith married in 1900 she was equipped with a complete knowledge
of the usual faults of the young married man, of the dangerous
tendencies which must be nipped in the bud by his loving and
protective wife, and of the special points which she must remember to
keep always in mind when building up out of the faulty material to
hand a perfect specimen of the genus "husband."
She realised beforehand that even on the honeymoon a young wife could
not afford to be contented with any lapse from these high standards
which it was her duty to impose upon the man whom she had honoured
with her hand; one must begin as one meant to go on.
In this Spartan mood Edith Beckett steeled herself to marry Rodney
Greene, and it is fair to say that never once did she fall into the
pitiful weakness of condoning in silence any breach on Rodney's part,
of manners, morals, or good behaviour.