poor man! I would do the work of a ploughman for him."

"Then why don't you marry him, Martha?" I said, with innocent
impertinence.

"Marry him! I wouldn't marry him for ten thousand pounds, child!"

"Why not, if you love him so much? I'm sure he wouldn't mind!"

"Marry him!" repeated Miss Martha, and stood looking at me as if here at
last was a creature she could _not_ understand; "marry the poor dear man,
and make him miserable! I could love any man better than that! Just you
open your eyes, my dear, and see what goes on about you. Do you see so
many men made happy by their wives? I don't say it's all the wives'
fault, poor things! But the fact's the same: there's the poor husbands
all the time trying hard to bear it! What with the babies, and the
headaches, and the rest of it, that's what it comes to--the husbands are
not happy! No, no! A woman can do better for a man than marry him!"

"But mayn't it be the husband's fault--sometimes, Martha?"

"It may; but what better is it for that? What better is the wife for
knowing it, or how much happier the husband for not knowing it? As soon
as you come to weighing who's in fault, and counting how much, it's all
up with the marriage. There's no more comfort in life for either of them!
Women are sent into the world to make men happy. I was sent to your
uncle, and I'm trying to do my duty. It's nothing to me what other women
think; I'm here to serve your uncle. What comes of me, I don't care, so
long as I do my work, and don't keep him waiting that made me for it. You
may think it a small thing to make a man happy! I don't. God thought him