hesitated a moment, apparently running over in his mind the great ones
on earth, when his eyes rested on Mrs. Choate at the other end of the
table, who was watching him with great interest in her face, and
suddenly replied, "If I could not be myself, I should like to be Mrs.
Choate's second husband."

"Pleasant words are as a honeycomb, sweet to the soul and health to the
bones." It is the little disputes, little fault-findings, little
insinuations, little reflections, sharp criticisms, fretfulness and
impatience, little unkindnesses, slurs, little discourtesies, bad
temper, that create most of the discord and unhappiness in the family.
How much it would add to the glory of the homes of the world if that
might be said of every one which Rogers said of Lord Holland's sunshiny
face: "He always comes to breakfast like a man upon whom some sudden
good fortune has fallen"!

The value of pleasant words every day, as you go along, is well depicted
by Aunt Jerusha in what she said to our genial friend of "Zion's
Herald":--

"If folks could have their funerals when they are alive and well and
struggling along, what a help it would be"! she sighed, upon returning
from a funeral, wondering how poor Mrs. Brown would have felt if she
could have heard what the minister said. "Poor soul, she never dreamed
they set so much by her!

"Mis' Brown got discouraged. Ye see, Deacon Brown, he'd got a way of
blaming everything on to her. I don't suppose the deacon meant
it,--'twas just his way,--but it's awful wearing. When things wore out
or broke, he acted just as if Mis' Brown did it herself on purpose; and