An excellent move, no doubt; but then the house was his, and if he saw fit to keep a tub of tobacco burning in the middle of the parlor floor, he had a perfect right to do so.

However, he humored her in this as in other matters, and smoked by stealth, like a guilty creature, in the barn, or about the gardens.

That was practicable in summer, but in winter the Captain was hard put to it.

When he couldn't stand it longer, he retreated to his bedroom and barricaded the door.
Such was the position of affairs at the time of which I write.
One morning, a few days after the great snow, as Miss Abigail was dusting the chronometer in the ball, she beheld Captain Nutter slowly descending the staircase, with a long clay pipe in his mouth.

Miss Abigail could hardly credit her own eyes.
"Dan'el!" she gasped, retiring heavily on the hat-rack.
The tone of reproach with which this word was uttered failed to produce the slightest effect on the Captain, who merely removed the pipe from his lips for an instant, and blew a cloud into the chilly air.