The Continental Monthly | Page 8

it. I know not how long I indulged in these thoughts,
with my eyes on the ground, or seeing all things 'as though I saw them
not,' but when I did raise them to take cognizance of any thing, there
was, a few degrees above the horizon, the evening star; it shone as
entirely on me as though it shone on me exclusively. It is thus, I thought,
with His love; thus it melts into each individual soul. Such gentle
thoughts as these, long after the star had sunk behind the western
mountains, were a calm light in my soul. And I awoke the next
morning, the old cheerful
MOLLY O'MOLLY.

VI.
I have often thought what splendid members of the diplomatic corps
women would make, especially married women. As much delicate
management is required of them, they have as much financiering to do
as any minister plenipotentiary of them all. Let a woman once have an
object in view, and 'o'er bog, or steep, through strait, rough, dense or
rare; with head, hands, or feet, she pursues her way, and swims, or
sinks, or wades, or creeps, or flies;' but she attains her object.
You poor, hood-winked portion of humanity--man--you think you
know woman; that she 'can't pull the wool over your eyes.' Just take a
retrospective view. Did your wife ever want any thing that she didn't
somehow get it? Whether a new dress, or the dearest secret of your soul,
she either, Delilah-like, wheedled it out of you, or, in a passion, you

almost flung it at her, as an enraged monkey flings cocoa-nuts at his
tormentor.
And how she has changed your habits, has turned the course of your
life, made it flow in the channel she wished, instead of, as heretofore,
'wandering at its own sweet will,' as the gently-winding but useless
brook has been converted into a mill-race.
There is Mr. Jones. Before he married, as free and easy a man as ever
smoked a meerschaum. Mrs. Jones is considered a pattern woman; but
of that you can judge for yourself. Her first reformation was in regard
to his club, from which he returned home late, redolent of
brandy-punch, and lavish of my dears. All she could say to him had no
effect, till, after the birth of little Nellie, she joined a Ladies' Reading
Society, meeting on his club evening; he wouldn't leave the baby to the
care of a servant, consequently staid at home himself.
He was also in the habit of resorting to the gymnasium, ostensibly for
exercise, as he was dyspeptic; but his wife suspected it was more to
meet his old cronies. Finding retrenchment necessary, and looking on
gymnastics somewhat as a Yankee looks on a fine stream that turns no
mill, she dismissed one of the servants, and so arranged it that the
surplus strength that formerly so ran to waste should make the fires,
rock the cradle, and split certain hickory logs. Very soon Mr. Jones,
who is a lawyer, found his business so much increased that he was
obliged to remain in his office all day, except at meal-time; after which,
however heartily he might have eaten, he never complained of
indigestion. With this, thrifty Mrs. Jones was delighted, till one day she
surprised him in his office, enveloped in tobacco-smoke, with elevated
feet, reading a nice new novel; you may be sure that after that, she
insisted on the exercise. As their family increased, thinking still further
retrenchment necessary, she gently broached the relinquishing of the
meerschaum. Finding him obstinate in his opposition, she one day
accidentally broke it. It was one that he had been coloring for years; he
had devoted time and attention to it, that, if properly directed, might
have made him a German philosopher, an antiquary, or a profound
theologian; or, if devoted to his law studies, would have fitted him for

Chief-Justice of the United States.
The countryman who mistook for a bell-rope the cord attached to a
shower-bath, was not more astonished at the result of pulling it, than
she was at the result of this trifling accident. Such an overwhelming
torrent of abuse as was poured on her devoted head; such an array of
offenses as was marshaled before her; Banquo's issue wasn't a
circumstance to the shadowy throng. She had recourse to woman's only
means of assuaging the angry passions of man--tears, (you know the
region of constant precipitation is a perpetual calm;) but these, instead
of operating like oil poured on the troubled waters, were rather like oil
thrown on the fire. Pleading her delicate health, she hinted that his
unkindness would kill her, and that, when she was gone, her sweet face
would haunt him. Muttering something about one consolation, ghosts
couldn't speak till spoken to,