me," I said to my astonished wife, "for expressing myself thus in
your presence, but that confounded story will be the ruin of me
yet. Until it is forgotten nobody will ever take anything I
write."

"And you cannot expect it ever to be forgotten," said
Hypatia, with tears in her eyes.

It is needless for me to detail my literary efforts in the
course of the next few months. The ideas of the editors with
whom my principal business had been done, in regard to my
literary ability, had been so raised by my unfortunate story of
"His Wife's Deceased Sister" that I found it was of no use to
send them anything of lesser merit. And as to the other journals
which I tried, they evidently considered it an insult for me to
send them matter inferior to that by which my reputation had
lately risen. The fact was that my successful story had ruined
me. My income was at an end, and want actually stared me in the
face; and I must admit that I did not like the expression of its
countenance. It was of no use for me to try to write another
story like "His Wife's Deceased Sister." I could not get married
every time I began a new manuscript, and it was the
exaltation of mind caused by my wedded felicity which produced
that story.

"It's perfectly dreadful!" said my wife. "If I had had a
sister, and she had died, I would have thought it was my fault."

"It could not be your fault," I answered, "and I do not think
it was mine. I had no intention of deceiving anybody into the