“Oh, yes, sir, she was always contrary.”
“THE ASS, SHYING, LOST HIS FOOTING, AND THREW OUR DAME INTO THE RIVER.”
AN AFFECTIONATE WIFE.
Matters came to such a pass between a husband and wife—who, having married against their will, lived a cat and dog life—that the husband one day gave his spouse a box on the ears, whereupon she, knowing he had a few days before killed a neighbour, began, without the least caring about the issue, to raise her voice, crying, “Seize the villain; he wants to kill me as he did So-and-so.” Somebody heard her, and the man was accused, and, in accordance with his own confession, condemned to be hanged. On his way to the gallows he begged to be allowed to speak with his wife. She came, and he stopped on the road; but the good woman, eager to see the last of his days, cried, “Husband, why stop still? Let us walk while we talk, and lose no time.”
CHASTISE WITH GOOD WORDS.
An honest husband, so ill-starred as to have married a troublesome widow, beat her with a light stick, whereupon she went and complained to her kinsfolk. The latter reprehended her husband, bidding him not treat his wife thus, but chastise her with good words. This he said he would do, whereupon the skittish widow conducted herself much worse. The good fellow, not to break his promise, took a cudgel, into which he cut the Pater Noster on one side, and the Ave Maria on the other, and when she misbehaved herself beat her with that. The wife renewing her complaints, her relations came to tell him he had ill kept his word. “Not so, friends,” replied the young man; “I have done what you bade me, and only chastised her with good words; read what is written on the cudgel.”
“READ WHAT IS WRITTEN ON THE CUDGEL.”