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Show morning completely deliver man. "Here, dear, is that $5 I promised you," and hia thumb and index flngar went down Into the lower pocket a the right side of his waistcoat, and Ke laid a $5 bill on the bureau. Mrs. Toggs murmured her thaks between stifled sobs, but retraced ' from touching the sacred testimonial of his dying love. For, surely, Mr. Toggs was nearing the end of his earthly career, and his avowed improvement im-provement was only a delusion. She gazed upon him in helpless abandonment abandon-ment to the inevitable. Mr. Toggs proceeded with his toilet, and when it was completed he turned suddenly toward the bureau and, picking pick-ing up the money he had shortly before be-fore laid there, said in his old way: "I think, Mrs. Toggs, you saved this much on me in household expenses, for I have not partaken of a single" meal while I have been sick. I may as well pay Elizabeth with it." . And he hastened to find Elizabeth. As Mr. Toggs left the room, his wife experienced a sensation of joy. Mr. Toggs was better. He was his old self again. She was relieved of the dread that hung over her and she was happy. "Here's the five dollars I promised you," Mr. Toggs said to Elizabeth, wha was busy preparing the morning meal I H Mr. Toggs' Generosity ii ne laiu uie out upon the sideboard in the diningroom and strode away. Mrs. Toggs and Elizabeth were st happy that they could only gaze iE admiration at Mr. Toggs as they saf at the table, while he ate sparingly of the morning repast. Happy Mrs. Toggs stood with Mr Toggs' lustrous high-top hat in hex hand when Mr. Toggs appeared ready to leave for his office. After he had taken a last reassuring look at himself in the hall mirror, he went to the diningroom, din-ingroom, and said to Elizabeth, as he took the ?5 bill from the sideboard: - 4 "I think your board has been worth this much for the time you have been with us as our guest." Mrs. Toggs never qestioned her husband's hus-band's intentions. It was enough that he was well once more, and she was happy. What Elizabeth thought and said as she journeyed homeward would not be complimentary as an epitaph. ; All that day Mr. Toggs' countenance was lighted with a complacent smile. Mr. Toggs was peculiar; but every one is peculiar who is assertive and does not think in all things just as we do. Mr. Toggs was not considered a generous gen-erous man; but then the standard for generosity varies so that we cannot always accept even the judgment of friends. ' Mr. Toggs was generous with himself. him-self. : This was unquestioningly conceded. con-ceded. In dress he was generous to prodigality.' The appearance of his well-developed 6 feet 2 of physical manhood, from the luster of his high top hat and immaculate linen to the sheen of his No. LOs was faultless. It was in his family relations that Madam Gossip charged him most unsparingly. un-sparingly. She said that he kept no servant for his wife; that he never allowed her family to visit her oii account of the added expense that would be incurred; that while he was clothed faultlessly,, she was but why should we be rummaging in other folks' closets to display their family- skeletons, when the very thought starts a commotion in dark recesses nearer home. Remember, Mrs. Toggs never com- worst or best of men, or change a lion into a lamb. Mr. Toggs, after a few hours' torture, became a lamb. He uncomplainingly swallowed quarts of scalding hot water. He chewed pepsin pep-sin tablets without a murmur. He swallowed swal-lowed Dr. Killer's remedies faithfully, and submitted to applications of mustard mus-tard plasters until the outer surface of his body had every appearance of being parboiled. ' Through it all not one word of complaint com-plaint or rebellion escaped Mr. Toggs' lips, and Mrs. Toggs was somewhat alarmed. As day and night in regular order succeeded each other until five revolutions revolu-tions of the earth on its axis had been completed, and Mr. Toggs avowed that the millstone was growing heavier, the fox was unwearied in his endeavors endeav-ors to claw out his vitals, and the inextinguishable inex-tinguishable fires burned with increasing increas-ing fury, and in the face of all he was growing more and more lamblike, Mrs. Toggs became correspondingly more -alarmed. " This complete change could presage only one thing the coming end. "Dear!" gasped the tortured Mr. Toggs, as he turned a look of intense piainea; not she. Had she not promised prom-ised at the sacred altar to love, worship wor-ship cherish, I mean and obey? And she did it so thoroughly that all independence inde-pendence of thought and action was lost in her devotion to her over-towering spouse. Mr. Toggs fell ill. He had been exceedingly ex-ceedingly generous with himself, and had indulged in a late banquet at the" Ego club. He awakened early in the morning with a most pronounced attack at-tack of indigestion. Mr. Toggs declared that he had swallowed the larger part of a millstone, mill-stone, and that it lay with its crushing crush-ing weight just below his diaphragm. Then he felt like the Spartan youth who concealed the stolen fox under his toga, and he experienced the burnings burn-ings of a thousand pitiless flames as they ate their way into his vitals. During the first hour's torture Mr. Toggs groaned and moaned and expressed ex-pressed himself in langnuage that was as forcible, as the conditions de- manded. Mrs. Toggs, without any undue dis- play of alarm, gave him the full serr I longing upon his unfailing wife and noted her anxious face, "won't you send for Elizabeth to come and assist you? You are overdoing yourself." Poor Mrs. Toggs could scarcely restrain re-strain herself until she hastened from the room, when she burst into a flood of tears. Mr. Toggs was certainly mortally ill. In all their twenty-three years of conjugal relations, he had never before applied to her so precious pre-cious an epithet, and for the first time he seemed concerned about her personal per-sonal comfort. And he had broken his oft-declared law that there would be no visiting relations of either side allowed in his home. Elizabeth had a reputation for being an exceptional nurse, and an expert in the knowledge of family remedies. So upon her arrival there was a resumption, re-sumption, or rather addition, of operations. opera-tions. The indigestion loosened its hold somewhat, and Mr. Toggs was grateful. "Clarissa, dear," he said assuringly, as he lay bolstered up in a large rocker, rock-er, "I feel much better, and if I continue con-tinue to improve, -and am well to- Hastened from the room, a picture of despair. He was a man well satisfied with himself. him-self. Frank E. Graff in Boston Globe. morrow, I'll give you $5 for your nursing nurs-ing and carej of me." Mrs. Toggs hastened from the room the picture of despair.. She was sure he was dying, and when she returned to his side, closely followed by the faithful Elizabeth, she manifested no sign of joy at her husband's assertion asser-tion of marked improvement. "Elizabeth," and Mr. Toggs' voice grew stronger, "I'll give you $5, too, if I am well to-morrow!" Then Mrs. Toggs had a presentiment by a rattling in the chest that he was marked for death, and her little body stooped in anticipation of the crushing blow. By noon Mr. Toggs declared that he felt well enough to go out for a walk about the block. As he was adjusting his lustrous high-top hat, he said, "If you'll give me the money I'll settle the account for the medicines at the druggist's." drug-gist's." Mr. Toggs never liked bills to hang. Mrs. Toggs handed her deoartine ' ( fill 1 iJT L I lord and master a shining gold eagle a part of her week's allowance for all household expenses. The druggist claimed half of the gold, and Mr. Toggs tucked the change in his lower right-side waistcoat waist-coat pocket. But feeling a suspicious sensation that prophesied a return of the tortures, he hastened home and calmly submitted to the untiring efforts ef-forts of his faithful nurses for relief. That night Mr. Toggs fell into a refreshing sleep and awoke in the Became a lamb. vice of her devottd nature. He had been sick once with rheumatism, and she had witnessed a display of the lack of all Christian graces in the nature of Mr. Toggs when sick, so she was not apprehensive. Indigestion may effect a complete transformation in its victim. It will make either a -Mint or a demon of the |