Living too Fast by Oliver Optic

I was married in the spring, and the bank gave me my vacation on the joyous occasion, so that I was enabled to make a bridal tour of ten days to the South. I went to Philadelphia, Baltimore and Washington, and while I distinctly recollect that I enjoyed myself exceedingly, and traveled like a prince, I can more vividly recall the rapidity with which my funds were expended. It had cost me all my salary to pay my board and to take Miss Lilian to the opera and the balls, but I could not afford to deprive Mrs. Glasswood of any luxury.

Before we started I was "hard up," and I tried to contrive some clever expedient by which the bridal tour might be dispensed with. I suggested to Lilian that the journey was not absolutely necessary; that some very "nobby" people staid at home after they were married. Her chin dropped down as though a ten pound weight had been attached to it, and she looked so sad and gloomy that I could not think for a moment longer of depriving her of this triumphal march, for so I am afraid she regarded it. Of course I did not hint to her that I could not afford to spend two or three hundred dollars in travelling, for we were still lovingly cheating each other into the belief that she was a princess and I was a representative of Crœsus himself.