so it takes at least two to make a home; and unluckily it takes only one to
spoil it.

Madame Roland once defined marriage as an institution where one person
undertakes to provide happiness for two; and many failures are accounted
for, no doubt, by this false basis. Sometimes it is the man, more often the
woman, of whom this extravagant demand is made. There are marriages which
have proved a wreck almost wholly through the fault of the wife. Nor is
this confined to wedded homes alone. I have known a son who lived alone,
patiently and uncomplainingly, with that saddest of all conceivable
companions, a drunken mother. I have known another young man who supported
in his own home a mother and sister, both habitual drunkards. All these
were American-born, and all of respectable social position. A house
shadowed by such misery is not a home, though it might have proved such but
for the sins of women. Such instances are, however, rare and occasional
compared with the cases where the same offence in the husband makes ruin of
the home.

Then there are the cases where indolence, or selfishness, or vanity, or the
love of social excitement, in the woman, unfits her for home life. Here we
come upon ground where perhaps woman is the greater sinner. It must be
remembered, however, that against this must be balanced the neglect
produced by club-life, or by the life of society-membership, in a man. A
brilliant young married belle in London once told me that she was glad her
husband was so fond of his club, for it amused him every night while she
went to balls. "Married men do not go much into society here," she said,
"unless they are regular flirts,--which I do not think my husband would
ever be, for he is very fond of me,--so he goes every night to his club,
and gets home about the same time that I do. It is a very nice
arrangement." It is perhaps needless to add that they are long since