aware that I didn't know as much about farming as about art and literature. However, the editor's confidence in my ability to do the work and Marion's glowing enthusiasm caused me to keep my misgivings to myself. Indeed, though I never boast, I find it difficult to detract from another person's estimate of my knowledge or attainments; it seems less egotistical to smile and look modest than to enlarge upon one's own affairs. There was just one thing that caused me a pang. Marion, in pointing out the advantage it would be to me to have a free hand in writing, casually acknowledged that for a long time she had felt that[Pg 21] criticism was not my forte and that I would write better when I had more scope for my imagination. My pained surprise at this confession moved her to merriment, and she laughingly declared that a woman's vanity was all on the surface, but a man's was unfathomable. Did I answer back? No, I didn't, for when I am truly grieved I merely smile faintly with patient, loving forgiveness; besides, I didn't know what to say. Afterward—for I didn't realize it at the time—I saw that I felt hurt, not because she had underrated my previous work, but because she had heretofore simulated a proper appreciation of it. I cannot bear to think that my wife is capable of stooping to any kind of pretence, and I am quite single-minded in this, for I like her to be more perfect—infinitely more perfect—than I am. One would suppose this statement to be unquestionable. It isn't; she immediately asks why, and in the silence which follows when I am trying to think she repeats the query with such challenging meaningful emphasis that, alas!—I cannot say. [Pg 20] [Pg 21] [Pg 22] [Pg 22] II PETER WAYDEAN IS FOUND WANTING II PETER WAYDEAN IS FOUND WANTING "No," said the postmistress, shaking her head dubiously, "I don't think you'd find a place to suit within a mile of this station. You say you want a small farm with a middling good house, and the only vacant place about here has a hundred acres and the house ain't no better than a shanty." It was the prettiest bit of country that we had yet found in our search for our ideal farm, and the answer of the postmistress caused us keen
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