A good dog deserves a good bone, But, lest the ladies should consider this rather a left-handed compliment, let me introduce here a much admired epigram: Lord Erskine, at women presuming to rail, Called a wife a tin kettle that's tied to one's tail, 'Tis the fault of the puppy to which it is tied! To be or not to be' having been thus, proverbially, decided in the affirmative, the question of Choice next follows. Folklore regards it very much as a lottery. Put your hand in the creel, And draw out either an adder or eel. Wiving and hanging go by destiny. He that's born to be hung will never be drowned. And on the same principle Marriages are made in heaven. To marry a sheep, to marry a shrew, Who lives on earth, below the sky. Still there is such a thing as Natural Selection, nor is advice on the subject wanting; Good looks are not the only things to be considered. There may be. A fair face and a foul bargain. So the Italians warn us Bellezza e follia Son' soven' in compagnia. Pretty fools are no ways rare, Wise men will of such beware. Another warning is this Marry above your match, and you get your master. D That house doth every day more wretched grow "The white mare is sometimes the best horse in the stable.' The Italians have a saying Nè donna, nè tela Non comprar di lume di candela, which may be roughly rendered, He will not choose, the man who's bright, Or wife or clothes by candle-light. The English version is Choose your wife on Saturday and not on a Sunday, i. e. in her work-o'-day clothes. The ingenious Mr. Coelebs is said to have determined his choice, by observing the way in which three equally charming sisters partook of cheese. Perhaps that they did so at all would have been enough with some people; but let that pass. The First cut off a very thick slice of the rind. The Second ate it up rind and all. The Third adopted a happy medium; and, no doubt, was proposed to upon the spot. The Turks have a saying Observe the hem, and take the linen, i. e. observe the mother, in choosing the daughter; that is, again, Go to a good stock. We have it on very high authority. As is the mother so is her daughter. Ezek. xvi, 44. Choose a horse made, and a wife to make. The following general directions may be serviceable. Good wives to Snails should be akin, But not to carry, fortune's hacks, All they are worth upon their backs. Good wives like city Clocks should be But not, like city Clocks, so loud As to be heard by all the crowd. Good wives like Echo should be true, As to insist on the last word. Coming now to the Lady's side of the arrangement, we find one of the fair sex expressing her views, but alas! the unfair sex has had the spoiling of the statement. "Whenever I marry," says masculine Ann, "I must really insist upon wedding a man!" But what if the men (and the men' are but human.) Should insist, and not less, upon marrying a woman? Proverbs suggest Better an old man's darling than a young man's slave. or as Theodore Hook once wrote, as I am reminded by the Times Reviewer, Don't talk of hearts, Of flames and darts, Soon flattery turns to snarling : To pass my life, A happy wife, Make me an old man's darling. And Coventry Patmore has admonished, Maid choosing man, remember this, For you will soon be of the same. If you change the name, and not the letter is another, and almost the silliest saying of the kind with which I am acquainted. Every couple is not a pair. which must have been the case with those Two Incompatibles who Parted with but one regret, Which was, that they had ever met! 'Men dream in courtship but in wedlock wake.' Some Choices are somewhat unfortunate. Abel fain would marry Mabel, Well, it very wise of Abel. But Mabel won't at all have Abel, And some Choices are sufficiently startling, but Many men many minds. Many women many whims. has been also unkindly added; but then most people know their own business best, and like to manage their own affairs in their own way. There has been many a happy edition of 'Beauty and the Beast.' Popping the question is thus concisely decided. He either fears his fate too much Or his desert is small Who dares not put it to the touch Happy's the wooing That's not long a doing. We will now suppose the choice made and admitted, and that the Time is under discussion. Name the day! Well, Folklore is equal to the occasion. Marry in Lent Live to repent. Perhaps the discovery that the fees are then double may have something to do with this. But Plutarch gives the same kind of reason in his time; only, singularly enough May was their time for Lent observances.-Quæstiones R. 86. Marry in May You'll rue the day. May never was the month of love For May is full of flowers; But rather April, wet by kind, For love is full of showers.-Southwell. To marry in May Is to wed povertaie. Very hard upon May, I have always thought; some say that the prejudice originated in Scotland, for this was the month in which Mary Queen of Scots married Darnley; but, as a learned divine has lately pointed out to me, the feeling may be found expressed even as far back as the time of Ovid, as has been obligingly shown me in a late letter to the Times Nec viduæ tædis eadem, nec virginis apta Mense malum Maio nubere vulgus erit.-Fasti 489-492. Let maid or widow that would turn to wife Avoid this season, dangerous to life. If you regard old saws, mind, thus they say 'Tis bad to marry in the month of May.-Professor Cheetham He who marries between the sickle and scythe Will never thrive! As our frugal country folks say, 'After harvest !' Before you marry which is a particular application of what Solomon gives generally "Prepare thy work without, And make it fit for thyself in the field; Prov. xxiv, 27. And, now the Match is made, how has it turned out ? Wedlock's a padlock. and therefore is not to be lightly entered upon; You've tied a knot with your tongue you can't untie with your teeth. Bear and forbear. Let neither expect too much. |