S. R. Crockett

“ But I think she was pleased all the same.
"Where's Nance?" The question was shot out rather than asked.
I indicated the upper regions of the house with my thumb, and inclined my ear to direct her attention.
A high voice of wonderful tone and compass (if a little thin) was lifted up in a decimating howl. Ensued a gentle confused murmur: "Didums, then? Was it, then?" together with various lucid observations of that kind.
A change passed over the Hempie's face.
"Now we are in for it," I thought. "She will leave the house and never enter it again. The Hempie hates babies. ”

“ All that stuff in romances about kissing the beloved awake in the dear old rose-scented parlour, and about the lids rising sweetly from off loving and happy eyes, is, scientifically considered, pure nonsense. ”

“ My study, where I try upon occasion to do a little original work and keep myself from dropping into the rut of the pill-and-potion practitioner so common in rural districts, is next the little room where Nance sits reading, or sewing at the garmentry, white and mysterious, which some women seem never to be able to let out of their reach. ”

“ Presently the baby took the red thumb out of his mouth, and through the orifice thus created issued a bellow. The nurse came running. Nance took him in her arms, replaced the thumb, and all was well. Then she handed him back to the Hempie and kissed her as she did so. The Hempie raised her head into position naturally, like one well accustomed to the operation.
Nance came slowly back and rejoined me. She was unusually thoughtful.
"Well?" I said.
She nodded gravely and shook her head.
"It is true," she murmured, as if convinced against her will; "there is something. She is different." ”

“ A man becomes at once broader and louder, more unrestrained in quotation, allusion, illustration, more direct in application. His vocabulary expands. In anecdote he is more abounding and in voice altogether more natural. But with women it is not so. They do not look blankly at the tablecloth or toy with the stem of a wineglass, as men do when the other sex vanishes. ”

“ If you listen closely you can hear a little subdued rustle. That is the chairs being moved gently forward nearer each other—not dragged, mark you, as a man would do. A man has no proper respect for a carpet. ”