LET other women say what they will, I for my part will ever maintain that a wife should always keep before her mind the very words of the marriage ceremony; and among others, the promise she has made to "love, honor and obey." This last word, I know, sounds ugly to many of my own sex; but that is entirely from a misapprehension. They suppose it to mean that a wife is to be a slave to her husband. And, to be sure, if you lived in a country of savages, and were fool enough to marry one of them, you might, I admit, be considered as fairly bound by your own act to be his slave; because among savages a wife is so regarded. And so again, if you took an oath of allegiance to the autocrat of Russia, you would make yourself his slave, because such is the Russian constitution.

But when we in this country swear allegiance to the king, we do not bind ourselves to take his proclamation for law, but only to obey him according to the constitution and custom of this country. And on the same principle you promise to obey your husband agreeably to the institutions and customs of a civilized country in the nineteenth century. The king, we know, is "in all causes and over all persons, within these his dominions, supreme;" that is, no Act of Parliament is valid till it has received the royal assent, and no minister of state, or judge, &c., can hold office except under the king's "sign manual;" but we know, also, that in practice the king never thinks of refusing the royal assent to any bill that has passed both Houses of Parliament, however distasteful it may be to him. And whatever papers his ministers put before him, he must sign; else they would not remain in office. And he cannot really appoint any ministers he may fancy; because no man could continue in office who could not command a majority in parliament. He may, perhaps, sometimes wish his "servants, the ministers," at the bottom of the sea, and his "faithful Com

mons" along with them; but still he must do what his ministers bid him, and they must do whatever parliament insists on. The "royal supremacy" consists, as all the world knows, in this: that he is required not only to let ministers and parliament do what they please, but also to issue his "royal commands" to that effect. They must act according to their own will, and he must declare it to be his will also, and must back it by his authority, even though his own private inclination should be quite another way.

Such, as we all know, is our glorious constitution. And somewhat like it is the constitution of the marriage-state. That is, the husband is to be in all things supreme, you being virtually the ruler in the wife's proper department, but taking care, as far as possible, that your husband's sanction, and indeed command, should support whatever you do. You are, in your own proper sphere, his representative, just as a judge represents the king; and you are to show your loyal obedience to him by doing your utmost to enforce compliance with all that he, in your person, shall decree and direct, and to bring him to give his sanction, as he is in duty bound to do, to all your decisions in your own department.

And what is the wife's proper department? Evidently her household. Domestic management, almost all would say, belongs to the woman; as the trade or profession, or public business, belongs to the man. By domestic concerns I do not mean merely the office of a housekeeper, but all that relates to home: the servants, the children, social intercourse with friends and neighbors: all this, as well as the house and furniture, and the management of expenditure, belongs to the wife.

In the humbler walks of life all people understand this. A carpenter, for instance, or a bricklayer, is reckoned a good husband if he keeps to his chisel or his trowel, works hard all the week, and regularly brings home

But even men themselves may supply you | with examples to rouse your emulation, and induce you to make some sacrifice to duty. Do you not see men (selfish as we know man is compared to woman) consenting to be ministers of state? They undertake the laborious task of providing for the good government of the country; they bear being reproached, instead of thanked for it; it takes them sometimes several hours, or days, of alternate coaxing and threatening to induce the king to issue his "royal commands," to them to do what they judge best, and which he utterly dislikes; and they make long speeches in parliament, and use every kind of manœuvre to get a bill passed for their country's good; and all because they know that the country could not be well governed without them.

All this should inspire you with emulation. You should consider that no exertion is too great to enable you to make your superior judgment available in the service of your husband, even though he should be so stupid as not to perceive the benefit. For, after all, you will, perhaps, not be able to succeed completely. Some husbands are given to insist on interfering in the expenditure of income, the management of children and of servants, and other domestic concerns. But you must do the best you can, always remembering that every shilling your husband spends withour your leave is downright robbery, though you may be obliged to submit to it; and that whatever household control he assumes is an act of usurpationthe worst kind of usurpation, just as many account suicide the worst kind of murderfor it is rebellion against himself, you being in your own department his representative, and invested with all his authority.

Husbands must be managed according to their dispositions. There is no one kind of treatment that will suit all alike. You must try the mode you think most likely to suit your own husband's character, and if that does not succeed, try another. But it is much better if you can hit on the right system at once, than to have to make a change. In particular, the imperious mode-the straightforward, determined assumption of authority-which succeeds very well with some meek-spirited men, and is the only plan with some cowardly ones, is a very dangerous course if it does fail. A man whom his wife has attempted to bully, and without success, is apt to become totally unmanageable by all methods afterwards. And the same may be said of scolding. It succeeds

admirably with some men; but when it does not succeed, it weakens a wife's influence.

Generally speaking, therefore, I should recommend gentle means to begin with ; and harsher modes to be resorted to afterwards, if the former fail. Many men are governed by their affections. For though a man is a very unfeeling, hard-hearted animal, compared with one of us, still there are many of them that have affection enough to be ruled through the means of that. And though they are generally too unfeeling to shed tears themselves, except on very rare occasions, it is well worth trying whether a man may not be softened by his wife's tears when he is disposed to be refractory. But take care not to wear it out. To be always crying on very slight occasions, may so accustom a man to the sight that his heart will become (as Dickens expresses it) quite waterproof.

Perseverance, again, will succeed with. some men when nothing else will. I have known men who could stand coaxing, and scolding, and weeping, fairly wearied out by incessant importunity, just as many people are bothered into giving to a beggar. I would have you try the other ways first; but, if everything else fails, it is worth trying whether a man may not be wearied out, so as to give way merely for the sake of hearing no more about it.

But in all cases I strongly recommend you never openly to claim power, nor to boast of governing your husband, either to him or any one else. You may sometimes, like the dog in the fable, miss the substance by catching at the shadow. And, at any rate, it has a bad appearance in most people's eyes.

Your glory should be, not only to take care that your husband should do what he ought, but that he should be compelled to confess that it is his own choice. It is glorious to represent yourself as submitting with angelic meekness to the imperious sway of your lord, when in reality you have prevailed on him to give way, and to be guided by your better judgment to do just what you think best. When you have prevailed on him to buy you a smart dress, which in heart he grudges, or to set up his carriage, or to change his residence, or to cut an old acquaintance, or to change his name, or to frequent parties which he detests, &c., you should whisper to all your friends, as a great secret, that Mr.

would have it so, and that, though you said all you could to persuade him to the contrary, finding him bent upon it, you felt it your duty to comply.

And if ever he should protest against your saying this, do not scruple to contradict him most vehemently, and to insist on it that you merely yielded to his wishes; which, after all, is, as I have already explained, quite true, since in these matters your will is to be considered as his.

I may as well mention, by the way, that letters either to or from you, are perfectly sacred from a husband's eye. And if ever, under any circumstances, or for whatever reason, he has opened a letter to you, though he might know it to be a tradesman's bill that he was to pay, let him have no peace day or night for some time. But, on the other hand, you have a perfect right to see all his letters, because there is always a likelihood that they may relate to domestic matters, which are your province. I know there are husbands so unreasonable that they absolutely will not allow this, and then you must e'en yield to brute force. Nor would I say that it is worth while, if your husband is very resolute on this point, to risk a quarrel about it. Only remember what your rights are, and enforce them when you can.

comply with. And if ever he is disposed to censure or complain of any of the children, or to deny or forbid them anything, do you make your appearance as intercessor in the child's presence, so as to present an agreeable contrast to him. Should he venture to remonstrate against this, or, indeed, to remonstrate on any point in the presence of the children, you should complain bitterly of the cruelty of finding fault with you before your own children. And take care to do this before them; that is, to do what would be the very thing you are censuring, if the children were to be considered as his no less than yours. Nothing will more effectually impress on their minds that it is not so, and that the children are the rightful property of the mother.

With servants I don't think it advisable to go quite so far; only let them all understand that it is to you they must look for directions aз to all they are to do. And as for his dismissing, or engaging, or retaining any, without your permission, that is to be regarded as a flagrant encroachment on your rights, which must be resisted to the uttermost.

One point there is in which many husbands are particularly apt to encroach, the management and control of children. I have known a man act as if he really thought the children belonged to the father as much as to the mother. And yet what a mere nothing is the love, and care, and anxiety of a father, compared with that of a mother! And how incomparably inferior is a man's judgment to a woman's in all that relates to the care and education of children! All this you must take due care to impress on your children, lest they should make the mistake of feeling a disproportionate-that is, an equal-degree of regard for their father. In order to impress this wholesome lesson the more fully both on them and him, you should take care to let most of the indulgences and gratifications appear to proceed from you, and the restraints, and privations, and punishments from him. "Papa won't allow this," and "Papa insists on so and so," even when it is your own will that they are required to

It is well known that there can be no real love without jealousy. And, therefore, when you made a vow to love your husband, you engaged to do your best that he should love no one else-woman or man-except such as, being your own friends, are, so far, a part of yourself. But jealousy, I need hardly say, is never to be acknowledged, but always strenuously denied. Your husband, on the other hand, is to be bitterly reproached if he should ever dare to manifest the least jealousy of any friend of yours, female or male, whom you may find it convenient to consult with as to the best way of fulfilling your difficult task of managing such a creature as a man, and to talk over domestic grievances.

Various occasions will present themselves for prejudicing him against those whom you wish to keep from too close an intimacy. One mode, which is particularly successful with some men, is, to twit him with being

led, governed, kept in leading-strings, by any one whom he is disposed confidentially to consult with. You may hint how much the world perceives and laments that a man of his good sense should be so much at another man's disposal, instead of thinking and acting for himself. And it will not be difficult for you, if you exercise any tolerable ingenuity, to make this true. If you hint, as a great secret, to each of your friends, how deplorably your husband is misled by Mr. So-and-so, and what a pity it is that he does not assert his independence, you will soon find that the world will say what you represent them as saying.

And here you are to observe that you must always, in speaking to your husband, or to any one else, of his friends, take for granted (as it is well known such is generally the case with men) that his friendship is founded on a mere capricious fancy. His esteem for them, and the good qualities he attributes to them, are to be set to the account of his partiality. And he is partial to them because they are his friends. They became his friends, not on account of any real merit, but because he took a fancy to them. On this assumption you must always proceed. Any degree of kindness and hospitality, therefore, which you show towards any of his friends whom you like, you are always to represent as a favor done to him-as an indulgence of a fancy of his.

Then, as for the procedure you are to adopt towards those friends of his whom you don't like, I need hardly point out to you how easily you may make your house unpleasant to them. If you are scrupulously and stiffly civil, distant, cold, and unwilling to enter into conversation, and on the watch to introduce whatever topics are the most likely annoy them, they will gradually draw off towards other houses in which they meet with a warmer welcome from the lady.

What I have said respecting friends, applies, in a great degree, to all other sources of enjoyment which your husband may have that are at all independent of you. His gun or fishing-rod, his pencil, his horses or dogs, his books or his garden, &c. are all to be regarded by you as more or less rivals; and you must take measures to prevent his obtaining too much gratification from them.

You yourself are bound, as a good wife, to be yourself a never-failing source of gratification to him. And this must be done, not merely by cultivating those obvious arts of pleasing, in which hardly any woman needs be instructed who is earnestly bent on putting

forth her attractions, but by tempering all these with that ingredient which is indispensable for the fastidious taste of man, variely. The charms of variety are proverbial. To make a man happy by a constant unvarying display of amiable qualities, is as mistaken an attempt as to think of composing a piece of music without discords, or to prepare a feast consisting of everything luscious, without salt, mustard, pepper, or vinegar. We enjoy fine weather ten times the more from our uncertainty when it will come, and how long it will last. In climates which have a constant blue sky and hot sun month after month, people get heartily weary of it. And, in respect of female society, the resort of men to polygamy in countries where it is permitted, shows how strong is the passion of men for variety.

This variety a good wife must furnish in her own person. It is the chief art for maintaining a strong hold on her husband's affections. To be constantly sullen and cold, or constantly peevish and complaining, or forever overbearing and violent, is to be like a climate of incessant rain and fog, or of perpetual storm. To be always kind, and yielding, and good-humored, is as tiresome and insipid as a climate of perpetual calm and bright sunshine. And every one knows how ungratefully indifferent or unkind, husbands generally are to wives who treat them with this uniform gentleness and kindness-this surfeit of amiability.

A perfect wife resembles that favorite liquor of the male sex, punch. Well-made punch is neither too strong nor too weak, too sweet nor too sour, but a judicious compound of all contradictions. Different palates, indeed, and constitutions, are suited by different proportions; but some mixture there must be for every one. The spirit may be considered as representing intellectual vigor, and knowledge of important subjects. A blue-stocking lady, therefore, is a strong dram of brandy, which most gentlefolks don't like at all, or only a very little on rare occasions. The water corresponds to ordinary chat about the passing occurrences of the day. This, by itself, is insipid, and only serves to quench the thirst we feel for social intercourse-for talking and hearing; but it is a good vehicle for something more agreeable. The sugar, of course, represents kindness, endearments of every sort, and, not least, flattery. A great deal of it, by itself, is cloying to the last degree; but it is a most acceptable addition to the other ingredients. And the lemon juice answers to opposition, contradiction, reproach, sarcasm, scolding, and every