Unofficial letters of an official's wife [by] Edith Moses.

AN OFFICIAL'S WIFE

hired rig three times a week on the Luneta. It is
as good as a play to see them return home, climb
up a little bamboo ladder, take off their fine attire
and sit down to a big round bowl of soup, which the
small boy in scanty garments sets before them. My
lady wears a chemise and a yard or so of red calico
around her body, while her husband, divested of
his black frock coat and immaculate trousers, is
cool and comfortable in a low-necked shirt and a
pair of drawers. They sit, one opposite the other,
over a soup bowl and ladle out the liquid with
spoons, eating it directly from the soup tureen.
They do not seem to have much liking for forks,
and eat rice with their fingers. Early one morning
I saw' the man standing at the open window warming carabao milk over a lamp and then drinking
it out of the saucepan. I was so interested in them
that I asked the coachman who they were and he
said the man was a poet. It reminded me they used
to tell us in Spain that many of the families who
drove in fine equipages on the Paseo lived on beans
in order to be able to keep up appearances. Our
neighbors seem to enjoy life, too. The wife plays
the piano and the husband sings every evening.
She bathes in the surf in the morning with the
small boy in attendance. He carries her sheet and
towel to the water's edge, and assists her to do her
hair. All three are gloriously happy three times a
week as they parade in style on the Luneta, and
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