THE TWO NEIGHBOURS.

CHAPTER I.

"She looketh well to the ways of her household."

PROV. xxxi. 27.

'DID any one ever know the price victuals is come to nowadays?" said Mary Brown, as she met her neighbour, Mrs. Smith. They were both on their way back to their homes after their weekly marketings, one Saturday afternoon. "I should like to know, unless the masters raise the wages, how they expect poor folks to live at all. Why, one can't even buy a piece of pork under tenpence a pound, let alone butcher's meat, and that's risen again. Now there's my husband-he never seems to think it's Sunday, if he does not get a hot dinner that day, and I'm sure I'm 'most dazed at times to know how to manage it. It's a regular puzzle, it is; however, he must do without it to-morrow, for we've had to shift our quarters-turned out for the sake

of a mite of back-rent; and I'm sure such a muddle as we're in, you'd not believe unless you was to see."

"Yes, it's hard times indeed for the poor," replied Mrs. Smith, in a much softer tone; "and one feels the high prices, especially in times of sickness. Now, my poor little Willie, the doctors are very fond of ordering him beef-tea and broth, and such like; and though, thank God, up to now, the child. has never wanted them, one has to look close to get them, at these prices. But we must hope, neighbour, for better times soon," added Mrs. Smith, cheerfully.

"Well, it's a wonder to me how you manage to get your boy broth and meat," returned Mrs. Brown; "for I can hardly find my children in bread and butter, let alone dainties, and that's true enough. Now it's no secret that my husband gets a shilling a week more than yours;-our family is the same, yet somehow or other we are always behindhand; whilst you, neighbour, never seem to get into debt or even to be puzzled for a shilling or so; but I dare say," added Mrs. Brown, in the same breath," sickness ain't always such a sorrow as one thinks for; for maybe you makes a good thing by it out of the district-visitors. Now there's that Jane Wood, for instance; I suspect, from all I hear, she's in no hurry to get well, for the shillings she gets from the ladies ain't any very small help."

Mrs. Smith drew herself up rather stiffly.

Neither me nor mine ever ask charity, Mrs. Brown," she said; "and as long as John and I have hands to work, we are not going to turn beggars. It's true Miss Young, the visitor, has taken a liking to my poor crippled boy, and brings him books and teaches him, but as to asking her for money, why I'd sooner starve first!" and the colour rose in Mrs. Smith's cheeks as she spoke.

"Well, you need not bristle up so," retorted Mrs. Brown. "Poverty's no shame; only as your husband isn't richer than mine, and you get meat every day, while we have often to eat dry bread, I don't pretend for to understand it, that's all; but I didn't mean no offence, neighbour. Maybe it's that you are a better manager than I; there's a deal in that, I've heard folks say!"

Ah, my readers, in this last sentence Mrs. Brown had solved the riddle;-and depend upon it the different appearance that many of the homes of our working friends present, lies, not so much in the amount of wages that the husband earns, as in the skill and contrivance of the wife, to turn to the best account whatever that sum may be.

There is a trite saying, which I dare say most of you know, for it has almost passed into a proverb, viz., That a man is what a woman makes him." And if this may be said in reference to the character of a man, well may the further clause be added,that " a man's home is what his wife makes it." Ah, if there were but more cheery homes, more com

fortable firesides, the public-houses would assuredly be less thronged, the money brought home would be more sufficient, and fewer wives would be heard to complain that they were left to spend their evenings alone.

Oh, how much depends on the choice of a poor man's wife! If men would only look beyond the pretty face that first strikes their fancy, and try to satisfy themselves that a certain amount of the knowledge of domestic affairs, so necessary for the management of a home and family, lay behind it, what different homes should we see among our working classes. But to return to our story.

John Smith and Robert Brown were both hardworking, industrious men, neither of them were ever seen loitering around the beershop-door, or sitting within the tap-room, but each regularly brought home his wages to his wife every Saturday afternoon; yet, while Brown, from the nature of his employment, earned a shilling a week more than Smith, the latter's home had always an air of comfort which the former's never knew. Smith's children were well fed and well clothed, whilst poor Brown's heart often ached to see his little ones in rags and tatters, shivering with cold, or clamouring for more food than they got. Yet what could he do? If he tried when he came home from work, which in truth he often did, to tidy up himself a bit now and then, things got as bad again directly.