Guy Wetmore Carryl

“ As a rule, the man whom you invite with pleasure, because he appreciates your wit, you dismiss with pleasure, because he takes exception to your politics. There is not one in a hundred who leaves your house as admirable in your eyes as when he entered it. ”

“ The water in my bathroom escapes from the faucet which is designed to keep it from flowing, and keeps from flowing down the exhaust pipe which is designed to let it escape. My doors have warped. I can’t shut those which I can open, and I can’t open those which I can shut. These, and many others of the kind, are things which not only call for the services of the mason, the plumber and the carpenter, but for my personal supervision, as well.”
“I see,” said Miss Berrith. “All the petty annoyances which a wife takes off her husband’s hands.” ”

“ Galvin, for example, could hardly be expected to issue instructions to the carpenter.”
“The carpenter?” repeated Miss Berrith. “But I thought you were through with carpenters long ago.”
“I am convinced,” I replied, “that just as spirits are supposed to frequent the scenes which were most familiar to them in life, so the unhappy householder will find his premises haunted more or less regularly by the masons, plumbers and painters who made the dwelling what it is, and have to be constantly recalled to make it what it ought to be. ”

“ In justice to myself, however, I am bound to say that, after I had definitely abandoned my attempt to make a schedule, I thought of a considerable number of other meats, such as Irish stew, and hash, and minced beef. But there are fewer vegetables in the world than I had supposed.
There was but one incident in connection with the earlier stages of my bachelor house- keeping which I found more humiliating to my self-esteem than this. I have in mind my visit, at the instance of Galvin, to the notion counter of Messrs. Wimple, Gabardine & Vale, who keep the largest department store in town. ”

“ There are many people who thus resemble one-half of a Seidlitz powder. So long as you don’t know what particular topic to mix with their intelligence, it remains flat and lifeless; but once stir it up with the proper ingredient and it promptly begins to effervesce. The other half of the Berrith powder was Napoleon, and as Arbuthnot is something of a Bonapartisan himself, the two of them got on famously — and left Miss Berrith to me.
“And how do you manage to get along with Darius?” ”

“ She proposed to have me arrange a schedule of my fare, whereby the burden of responsibility should be shifted from her shoulders to mine. This, to assuage her desperation, I agreed to do, and having my pencils fortuitously pointed, forthwith set to work to map out meals for a fortnight ahead. Thus to provide for forty-two meals would seem to be simplicity itself, said my mind to me.
First in order, I set down the meats: roast beef, beefsteak ... chops ... lamb ... mutton —
As I live, I could think of no more!
I did better with the vegetables, which mounted up to twelve ”

“ So far as the scope of a woman’s utility is concerned, there is only one individual who knows less about it than a bachelor.”
“And that is?” I asked.
“A married man,” said Miss Berrith.
Arbuthnot came again, two Sundays later, but I was not so pleased to see him as I had been on the first occasion. It is to be presumed that a man would always be gratified to act as host to angels ”

“ The most generous host would fain be sure his note has not been misunderstood.
2. Order the room assigned to you as if it were your own — or even more so. The servants have several other things to do.
3. Rise when you are called. Time waits for no man, and there is less reason why a hot oven should.
4. If you don’t see what you want, ask for it, for nothing flatters more the vanity of a host. ”