woman's trust. 
147 
their first brood is fledged, need haunt his nuptial 
dreams, for other maternal wings will wait with 
eager tenderness to take her place over their 
angular, fuzzy little idols. 
Ever-to-be-envied biped ! 
One day, while upon their journey home, Mrs. 
Maxwell brought the party to a halt by signaling 
game ahead. 
You have always heard of woman’s devotion ; 
well, it is no illusion. The half of it can’t be 
told. No one knows it but women, and they 
haven’t egotism enough to repeat it. 
If it is a man to whom one of them is devoted, 
he cannot treat her with such cruel indifference 
and neglect — he cannot do a thing under the sun 
so mean— but she will find some excuse for him, 
if there is foundation enough for an excuse so 
that even a foot of her fancy can fasten upon it. 
If there is not, ten chances to one she will forgive 
him, simply because she wants to, with an indiffer- 
ence to reason that is fairly sublime. 
There is only one way she can avoid doing 
so, and that is to persuade herself that she has 
been deceived in the person, and has been 
worshipping an ideal, which the man only re- 
minded her of. Then she is at liberty to hate 
him. 
If she is devoted to dress, men don’t need any 
information on that subject If they don’t fancy 
