The Forgetful Husband

Pacific Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Oakland, California · Aug 28, 1879

The Forgetful Husband.

"O, dear! what shall I do? The hoop has burst off my wash-tub, and my suds are all over the floor!" said Mrs. Alden, in a tone of despondency, to her husband, as he came in to wash his hands at the sink, after oiling his new horse-rake.

"That is bad, Jennie. You will have to let your washing go till to-morrow; then you can borrow Mrs. Selden's tub."

"But this will all fall to pieces if it stands, and we are expecting company to-morrow."

"I can't help it; I can't stop the work to go off with it now. You must make hay when the sun shines if you do at all. Can't you tie it up, so that it will do to-day? I should think you might."

"Perhaps so, if you will help me. What can I take?

"Oh, any thing for this time; but really I ought not to stop a minute. Where is your clothes-line?"

"The colored clothes are on it, to dry."

"Hang them on the fence and let's have it quick."

So Mrs. Alden trotted out and moved her clothes and took the line down, while Mr. Alden stood in the door and whistled impatiently.

"Do mop up this water, Jennie. How can you stand in such a puddle? There, I forgot to get you a new mop-handle, but you can make it go to-day, can't you?"

"I suppose I shall have to. You promised to get one three weeks ago, when you broke this."

"I know I did, but I never think of it—a man has so many things to see to. There, that will go this week; it doesn't leak much. I don't know what made it break."

"The hoop rusted out. The old tub has done good service; it has been in use fifteen years."

"There! What did you leave the wash-board there for? I have broken it all to pieces."

"It is worn out and rotten. I wish you would get me a new one. I can never tinker it up again."

"Rub your clothes with your hands; my mother always did, and she never had a wash-board in her life."

Alden marched off to the hay-field, before he met another catastrophe to take up his time.

He was hardly out of sight before a tin peddler's cart stopped at the door, containing a collection of all articles used in a family, from wash-tubs down to brooms, mops, and pins.

"Anything in the way of trade, Mrs. Alden, to-day?" asked the man.

"No, I think not. My husband does not like to buy of peddlers. He says I always get cheated."

"Have you not as good a right to have suitable apparatus to work with as he has? He has a new horse-rake and a hay-tedder, and his wife is washing in a tub tied up with a rope, and a wash-board that looks as if Noah's wife brought it out of the ark, and a leaky water-pail; a dipper without a handle; a broken mop-handle—bless me! Mrs. Alden! What is the use? You had more money when you were married than he had, and I would have tools to work with that were comfortable, to say the least. He never stops to think what a thing costs, if he needs it, or if it will make his work easier. It tires you more to get along with these things than it does to do your work."

Mrs. Alden sat down and looked the property over. It was ridiculous to get along in this way. The peddler was right; she had more money than her husband when they started life, and she had worked harder than ever he had. She had managed every way to get along and he never thought she needed any thing new or convenient. Her setting out was almost worn out and nothing was ever replaced. "You must make it do; it costs everything to live!"—and so she had dragged along year after year, and things wore out and were not replaced. A big lump rose in her throat as she sat there thinking.

"What do you ask for your wash-tubs?" she inquired at length.

"Two dollars for the large ones; a dollar and a quarter for the next size. Mop-handles for a quarter, wash-boards a quarter, dippers 20 cents, brooms 30."

"Hand me down two wash-tubs, if you please—one of each size; a zinc wash-board, too."

"Yes; and a pail and dipper, too? I would have them."

And she did have them, and sundry other necessary things, amounting in all to the little sum of $12. She paid in barter, such as feathers, rags, eggs, dried apples, and butter, and went to work with renewed courage; but she knew that her husband would growl at the outlay and expected a regular tempest at dinner.

She was not disappointed. But she had got the things and was glad of it and couldn't feel very bad. Alden opened his eyes in astonishment.

"You paid twice what the things are worth. I could have bought them cheaper. We could have got along a while longer."

"I suppose I have as good a right to judge of what I need to do my work as you have to get things to make your work easy; and I made up my mind to-day that when I needed any thing I should have it hereafter. You know that every article I bought to-day was actually needed in the house. You have said time and again you would get them, but you never remember it. It is a hard place for a woman to be placed in, to have to do her work and nothing convenient to do it with. It is like the ancient Israelites, compelled to make bricks without straw, and I am not going to do it any longer."

"All owing to the hoop bursting off the wash-tub to-day."

"Yes, that was the last feather that broke the camel's back; that and the new horse-rake came too near together. I could not avoid contrasting your conveniences with mine; and you can see yourself how it stood. You have every new machine that is intended to make farm work easy, and I have nothing at all."

Mr. Alden said no more, but ate his dinner in silence, and the hired men exchanged significant glances at each other. They had thought and spoken of the patience which the little woman had shown in working at such a disadvantage, and always trying to make the best of what she had, and they were heartily glad that she had at last made a protest against the injustice.

After the day's work was done, Alden drove his team down to the village, and when he came back he brought a new stove for the kitchen, a new pump for the cistern, and a butter-worker for the dairy, and his wife has, since that washing-day, found that her rough places have been smoothed in a most satisfactory manner. Her good man had never thought about it. He did not mean to be unjust, but—he didn't think!