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- 2026-01-30T07:57:45.581Z
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- answer, the next day, she gave me to understand that either she or the
chimney must quit the house.
Finding matters coming to such a pass, I and my pipe philosophized
over them awhile, and finally concluded between us, that little as our
hearts went with the plan, yet for peace' sake, I might write out the
chimney's death-warrant, and, while my hand was in, scratch a note to
Mr. Scribe.
Considering that I, and my chimney, and my pipe, from having been so
much together, were three great cronies, the facility with which my
pipe consented to a project so fatal to the goodliest of our trio; or
rather, the way in which I and my pipe, in secret, conspired together,
as it were, against our unsuspicious old comrade--this may seem rather
strange, if not suggestive of sad reflections upon us two. But, indeed,
we, sons of clay, that is my pipe and I, are no whit better than the
rest. Far from us, indeed, to have volunteered the betrayal of our
crony. We are of a peaceable nature, too. But that love of peace
it was which made us false to a mutual friend, as soon as his cause
demanded a vigorous vindication. But, I rejoice to add, that better and
braver thoughts soon returned, as will now briefly be set forth.
To my note, Mr. Scribe replied in person.
Once more we made a survey, mainly now with a view to a pecuniary
estimate.
"I will do it for five hundred dollars," said Mr. Scribe at last, again
hat in hand.
"Very well, Mr. Scribe, I will think of it," replied I, again bowing
him to the door.
Not unvexed by this, for the second time, unexpected response, again
he withdrew, and from my wife, and daughters again burst the old
exclamations.
The truth is, resolved how I would, at the last pinch I and my chimney
could not be parted.
"So Holofernes will have his way, never mind whose heart breaks for
it," said my wife next morning, at breakfast, in that half-didactic,
half-reproachful way of hers, which is harder to bear than her most
energetic assault. Holofernes, too, is with her a pet name for any fell
domestic despot. So, whenever, against her most ambitious innovations,
those which saw me quite across the grain, I, as in the present
instance, stand with however little steadfastness on the defence,
she is sure to call me Holofernes, and ten to one takes the first
opportunity to read aloud, with a suppressed emphasis, of an evening,
the first newspaper paragraph about some tyrannic day-laborer, who,
after being for many years the Caligula of his family, ends by beating
his long-suffering spouse to death, with a garret door wrenched off
its hinges, and then, pitching his little innocents out of the window,
suicidally turns inward towards the broken wall scored with the
butcher's and baker's bills, and so rushes headlong to his dreadful
account.
Nevertheless, for a few days, not a little to my surprise, I heard
no further reproaches. An intense calm pervaded my wife, but beneath
which, as in the sea, there was no knowing what portentous movements
might be going on. She frequently went abroad, and in a direction
which I thought not unsuspicious; namely, in the direction of New
Petra, a griffin-like house of wood and stucco, in the highest style of
ornamental art, graced with four chimneys in the form of erect dragons
spouting smoke from their nostrils; the elegant modern residence
of Mr. Scribe, which he had built for the purpose of a standing
advertisement, not more of his taste as an architect, than his solidity
as a master-mason.
At last, smoking my pipe one morning, I heard a rap at the door, and
my wife, with an air unusually quiet for her brought me a note. As I
have no correspondents except Solomon, with whom in his sentiments,
at least, I entirely correspond, the note occasioned me some little
surprise, which was not dismissed upon reading the following:--
NEW PETRA, April 1st.
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