somehow get back to the old story; thus America sends it back to us.

Words, if you keep'em, pays their keep,
But gabble's the short cut to ruin;
'Tis gratis, Gals half price,-but cheap
At no price if it hinders doin!

Ten measures heaven bestowed of speech divine,
And woman straightway ran away with nine.

certainly there is said to be this difference between a story told by a woman and a man,

The one is her story, the other is history.

The ladies however may find a charming exemplar, if they will listen to Mr. Pope where he tells of one,

Who never answers till her husband cools;
And, if she rules him, never shows she rules;
Charms by accepting, by submitting sways,
And has her humour most, when she obeys.
Disdains all losses, high above them all,

And mistress of herself, though china fall!

And men should remember that they can mostly escape the torrent, by letting alone the floodgates; He who cannot bear the clapper should not pull the bell.

He who the squalling cannot bear
Should never take the sow by the ear.

Good sooth! I hold

He scarce is knight, yea but half man, who lets
His heart be stirred with any foolish heat

At any gentle damsel's waywardness.—Tennyson.

That women cannot reason has been made the burden of another set of sayings. And to a certain extent this is undoubtedly true. They feel too keenly, and are too quick in their perceptions, to be able to allow time for the slower processes of mental argumentation. An epigram will occur that was made on a mirror.

I change, and so do women too,
But I reflect, that women never do!

Women are wise off-hand and fools on reflection.

But, says another proverb,

Woman's instinct is often truer than man's reasoning.

"Their conduct still right with their argument wrong:' as some poet has sung. This then is not a very heavy indictment. If she won't listen to reason, and will be impulsive, why

'Only call it pretty Fanny's way!'

And now, since

Every medal has its reverse side.—Ital.

let us turn to the ladies' side of the question; on which I confess to having been all the time; as Mr. Dizraeli said on a well known occasion, 'I am on the side of the Angels.' The late Dean Ramsay tells a story of how the new meenister excused himself to the lady laird for not bowing, as had been customary to the heritor's pew at the close of the sermon, by pleading that the Church of Scotland did not 'allow of Angel worship;' which plea one of his country men, a rejected lover, but withal a very philosophical one, might perhaps also have accepted as valid: thus he laments, but at the same time consoles himself for the inevitable,

A coof came in wi' routh o' gear,
And I hae lost my dearest dear,
But woman is but world's gear
So let the bonnie lassie gang!

He then continues, in lines that are better known,
O woman, lovely woman fair

An angel's form fallen to thy share,

"Twad been o'er meickle to gien thee mair,

I mean an angel mind;

The ladies may answer, at any rate, that a greater poet is found on their side.

Old Nature's self the lovely dears

Her noblest work she classes O,
Her prentice hand she tried on man

And then she made the lassies O!-Burns.

Fair tresses man's imperial race ensnare

And Beauty draws us by a single hair.-Pope.

Mr. Barrett also speaks on this point very pleasingly,

Not She with traitorous kiss her Saviour stung,
Not She denied Him with unhallowed tongue ;-
She, while apostles shrank, could danger brave,
Last at the cross, and earliest at the grave!

When others failed woman alone was brave

Last at the cross, and earliest at the grave.-Bary Cornwall. We come then now to ask, and are there other proverbs in which the women show up the men folks ? And the answer must be that such are surprisingly few. I ought to know. In a weak moment I once undertook to supply a friend, who found himself somewhat overmatched, with a few proverbial weapons. He used them with such effect, (I mean the masculine proverbs) that some Delilah thought it worth her while to make him betray his benefactor. He told wherein his strength lay. Immediately as might have been expected 'The Philistines' were 'upon' me! my devoted head received a perfect shower of sharp sayings; certainly a selection of the severest which my fair foes could put their hands to. As another proverb reminds us.

Every thing will come into use if you only keep it long enough. And so it shall be now with that startling epistle.

I was informed first and foremost,

That pilgrim is base who speaks ill of his staff, (i. e. his wife,) Man is the head, but woman turns it.

Why is man like a chapel ?

Because there's no living with him,

and woman like a church? Because there's no living without one.

When there's a lady in the case

You know all other things give place.-Gay.

The lords of creation men we call,

And they fancy we own their sway,

But pray,

did not Adam, the very first man, The very first woman obey?

It would be cruel to enquire of the triumphant fair one, and what came of it? as some one else has said, in lines more remarkable for point than poetry,

God made man upright at the first, and he

Would have continued so, but she

However the ladies as usual have had the last word

Again

'Tis said that we caused man to grieve;

The jest is somewhat stale;

The devil it was who tempted Eve,

And is not he a male ?

A man may be guided the whole livelong day
If he only imagines he's got his own way :

and again

Men have many faults, poor women have only two,

There's nothing right they say, and nothing right they do!

This last will have to be read between the lines,' as the saying is, and taken as womankind's exposure of the malekind's unreasonableness. They are sad sufferers no doubt, but they bear up well under it.

The old Sexton, in those charming Copsley Annals, gives a melancholy epitome of what is sometimes a woman's fate.

Under the water,
Under the yoke,
Under the ground;
To the font carried,

At the rail married,

And then-a mound!

But, notwithstanding this lament, how often the wife outlasts the husband, and single women outlive

bachelors, a thing which the Daily News not long ago was thus lucidly explaining to us.

'Nine men out of ten live in a perpetual state of 'irritation. Everything upsets them. Either the 'weather is all wrong, or the dinner is half spoiled, or 'the neighbourhood is dull, or it is too lively, or that 'horrid fellow is coming, or he won't come, or some'thing or other has happened contrary to His Highness's 'wishes. So he works himself into a perfect fever. 'He frets, and fumes, and chafes, and walks about the 'very embodiment of discontent. In other words he is 'killing himself! Slowly no doubt, but surely, for he 'does it every day Sundays included. Meanwhile the 'womenkind are taking it as quietly as possible. Even "'his' ill humour does not disturb them. They are re'signed to it as to any other inevitable dispensation of 'providence. There they sit, knitting or sewing, or doing crochet work, or nothing at all for that matter, 'yet perfectly contented. If it rains, well and good, 'they like a wet day by way of a change. Who ever 'heard of a woman seriously complaining of the 'weather? They abuse it sometimes, just for the sake ' of saying something, or in order to chime in with him,’ 'but there is no real heart in their complaints. Again 'who ever knew one of them in a hurry, or worrying 'herself about being punctual, as the men do? No 'wonder then that women live the longest. It is a 'happy dispensation. Their death might possibly 'hasten ours. But who can doubt that, when we die, 'they get rid of their greatest anxiety. Sometimes, 'indeed, it is only then that they seem to begin to live. 'The real wonder is then that they ever cease to do so!' This account'è vero,' is true: I venture to think that it is also ben trovato,' to the point.

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