was never anything on this earth like it! I knew who gave the whistle to
the child, but I could, not make those jealous mothers believe me. They
believed I did it, and the result was just what any man of reflection
could have foreseen: I had to order a hundred and ten whistles--I think
we had a hundred and ten children in the house then, but some of them are
off at college now--I had to order a hundred and ten of those shrieking
things, and I wish I may never speak another word if we didn't have to
talk on our fingers entirely, from that time forth until the children got
tired of the whistles. And if ever another man gives a whistle to a
child of mine and I get my hands on him, I will hang him higher than
Haman! That is the word with the bark on it! Shade of Nephi! You don't
know anything about married life. I am rich, and everybody knows it. I
am benevolent, and everybody takes advantage of it. I have a strong
fatherly instinct and all the foundlings are foisted on me.

"Every time a woman wants to do well by her darling, she puzzles her brain
to cipher out some scheme for getting it into my hands. Why, sir, a
woman came here once with a child of a curious lifeless sort of
complexion (and so had the woman), and swore that the child was mine and
she my wife--that I had married her at such-and-such a time in
such-and-such a place, but she had forgotten her number, and of course I
could not remember her name. Well, sir, she called my attention to the
fact that the child looked like me, and really it did seem to resemble
me--a common thing in the Territory--and, to cut the story short, I put
it in my nursery, and she left. And by the ghost of Orson Hyde, when
they came to wash the paint off that child it was an Injun! Bless my
soul, you don't know anything about married life. It is a perfect dog's
life, sir--a perfect dog's life. You can't economize. It isn't
possible. I have tried keeping one set of bridal attire for all
occasions. But it is of no use. First you'll marry a combination of