“And yet you cannot manage him! And you expect me to pity you? Bless me, if I had half your advantages, what I would make of them! But if you like to be a tame wife, my dear—if you are resolved upon it, tell me so at once, and I will hold my tongue.”
“I do not know well what I am resolved upon,” said Griselda, leaning her head in a melancholy posture upon her hand: “I am vexed, out of spirits, and out of sorts.”
“Out of sorts! I am not surprised at that: but out of spirits! My dear creature, you who have every thing to put you in spirits. I am never so much myself as when I have a quarrel to fight out.”
“I cannot say that is the case with me, unless where I am sure of the victory.”
“And it is your own fault if you are not always sure of it.”
“I thought so till last night; but I assure you last night he showed such a spirit!”
“Break that spirit, my dear, break it, or else it will break your heart.”
“The alternative is terrible,” said Griselda, “and more terrible perhaps than you could imagine, or I either till now: for would you believe it, I never loved him in my life half so well as I did last night in the midst of my anger, and when he was doing every thing to provoke me?”
“Very natural, my dear; because you saw him behave with spirit, and you love spirit; so does every woman; so does every body; show him that you have spirit too, and he will be as angry as you were, and love you as well in the midst of his anger, whilst you are doing every thing to provoke him.”
Griselda appeared determined to take this good advice one moment, and the next hesitated.