The Wilmingtonian, and Delaware advertiser., 1826-02-16
THE LADIES, FRIEND,
OF FEMALE HAPPINESS

Let US suppose the happier case of a
young woman, who from beauty and fortune,
is sure to receive offers-that is to say, who
will attract fools or sharpers, and be taken
as necessary appendage of her face or
her purse. Even here how little selection
is allowed to her,-she may reject one; per-
haps two: but if the third be merely free
from positive objections, prudence urges
his acceptance, relations second prudence,
and she marries a man because he affords
her no good excuse for hating him. The
Circassans of Europe have little more
choice than their namesakes of Asia. "The
happy pair" begin by committing great
mistake; they withdraw themselves from
the world to spend the honey moon togeth
er; familiarity produces its usual effects;
they see too much of one another at first,
and the results are exhaustion and enaui.--
She who marries an idlcr who will hang up
on her society till he is wearied, and then
seek recreation elsewhere, has not 50 ma
ny chances of happiness as the woman whose
husband is compelled to tear himself from
her company for his duties, and gladly re-
turns to it for his enjoyments.
! mans love generally diminshes after
marriage, while womans increases both
Of which results might have been anticipar-
ed.--We hear of ROSY letters, the silken
chains of love, the soft yoke of Hymen; but
who is to bear the soul grinding bondage Of
dislike, contempt, hatred? How is a wo-
man to avoid these feelings if she be NAL.
treated and insulted, and who has she to re-
dress her wrongse The laws, made by the
men, and therefore fagrantly in their own
favor provide no remedy; if she use her
sole weapon, the tongue, she is proclaimed
scold, shrew, and reminded of the duck
ing stool ; il she makes his own house un-
comfortable to her husband, every body S
else is open to receive him and his friends
exclaim-" Poor man he has been driven to
this by bad wife % if the deserted and in
Ijured woman, in the meantime, seeks reA
lief from her sorrows in the most nno-
cent recreation, Spite, with its argus eyes,
keeps watch upon her door, and Ca
iumny dogs her footsteps, kissing at her
with its thousand tongues, and splitting out
lies and poison from every one. Let no man
choose me for umpire III a conjugal dispute
| need not ask who is the dclinquent-my
heart has decided against him by antcpa-
ton.
Let us imagine, not a patient stockfish,
like Griseda, but an accomplished woman,
|" paired, not matched" with a drone OF a
Ounce who lounges all day long before the
hre, spitting into 1t ike great roasted ap-
pie, or submitted to the caprices of a man
who keeps his good temper for company
and his bad for his wife abroad, as smiling
and promising as Siberian crab, while at
home his hearts core is sour; or tormentcd
with proHigate, who but must have
done, although have not half finished, for
have stretched the line to the crack Of
doom. Wh.n | consider all the hardships
and trials to which the fair sex are subject
by those unjust institutions of society, which
exact the greatest strength from the weak
est vessel, and reflect, moreover, that nature
has unkindly imposed upon it all the pains
and penalties of continuing the race, car
only say once more, that thank Heaven fol
not having made me 4 woman.