The Evansville journal. [volume] (Evansville, Ind.) 1866-1870, 1869-07-14
0ATLY J0URF 81
ROred Husbands.
rom the saturday Review.i

a wreath of orange blossoms and a
pair of housekeeping grays, as the
last act that claims to be recorded
for both novelists and playWrights
assume that with marriage all the
great events of life have ceased. and
that, once welded to the beloved OBJ
jeot, there is sure to be smooth sail
ing and halcyon seas to the end of time.
1t sounds very cynical and shocking 10
question this pretty belief; but, un-
fortunately for us who live In the
world as 1t is, and not as it IS suppos-
ed to be, we find that even union
with the beloved object does not al
ways insure perfect contentment IN
the home, and that bored husbands
are by no means rare.
The ideal honeymoon is, of course,
an Elysian time, during which moth
ing works rusty or gets out of Joint:
and the ideal marriage is only a life
long honeymoon, where the happiness
is more secure and the love deeper, If
more sober; but the prose reality of
one and the other has often a terrible
dash of WEAKNESS in it, even under
the most favorable conditions. Bore
dom begins in the very honeymoon
itself. At first starting In married life
there are many dangers to be eneoun-
tered, not a shadow of which was
seen in the wooing. There are old
freaks of temper turning up quite I'M
expectedly; there IS the sense, so
painful to some men, of being tied for
life, of never being able to be alone
again, never free and without RESPONSE
bilities; there are misunderstanding
to day, and the struggle for mastery
to-morroW-the cloud, no bigger than a
s mans hand, which may prove to be
the tempest that will destroy all;
there is the unrest Of travelling, and
the aWkwardness of unusual assocla-
ton, to help in the general dlscom-
fort; or, if the happy pair have settled
down in a vale and a cottage for their
month, there is the sad safety
which all men feel after a time when
they have had one. companion only,
with no outside diversion to cause a
break. But the honeymoon at last
draws to a close, and the relieved
bridegroom gets back to his old
haunts, to his work, his friends, and
his club; and, though he takes to all
those things again with difference,
still they are helps and additions.
This is the time of trial to woman
IF she gets over this pinch, and is
sensible enough to understand that
human nature can not be kept up at
high pressure, even in love, and that
q man must sooner or later come
down from romance to worka day
prose, from the passionate lover to
the cool and sober husband-if she
can understand this, and settle into
his pace, without fretting on the one
hand, or casting about for unhealthy
Al ~ Il.
well, and will probably make a pleas
ant home, and thereby diminish the
boredom Of life. But, unfortunate y.
not every woman can do this; and 1T
is Just during this time of the mans
transition from the lover to the
friends, that so many women begin to
make shipWreck of their own happi-
ness and his. They think to keep
him romantic wOoer still. by their
tears at his prosaic Indifference to the
little sentimentalities once so eagerly
accepted aud offered shey try TO hold
him close BY their fattering but some
what tlresome eXactIons: their Jeal-
ousies-very pretty, perhaps. and quite
as tlattering-are infinite, and as base
less as they are infinite; all of which
Is very nice up to a certain point and in
the beginning Of things, but all of
which gets aWiully wearisome as time
goes on, and q man wants both little
change and little rest But women
do not see this; or, seeing it, they can
not accept 1t "a necessary condition of
things: wherefore they GO on in their
fatal way, and, by the very unwisdom
of their own love, bore their husband
out of his Or they grow substantially
cold because he is specifically cooler,
and think themselves justified in
ceasing 20 love him altogether be-
cause he takes their love for granted,
aud so has ceased to WOO it.
IF they are jealous, or shy, unsocial,
as so many woman are, they make life
very heavy by their exclusiveness, and
TIL NcPastic character they give to
IT, A man married to wo-
man ais kind is. In fact. house
prisoner, whose only hours of freedom
lie beyond the four walls of home
HIS bachelor friends are shut out
They smoke, or entice him to drink
more than his wife thinks is good for
him; or they induce him to bet on the
Derby, or to play for half-crowns at
whist or billiards, or they lead him In
some other way of offense abhorrent
to women. So the bachelor friends
are shouIdered out, and when the
husband wants to entertain them, he
must invite them to his club-if he
has one-and pay the penalty when
he gets home In few years time
his wife will be glad to encourage her
sons young friends to the house. for
the sake of the daughters on hand:
but husbands and sons are In a differ
cut category, aud there are few faith
ers who do not learn, as time goes on,
how much the mother will allow that
the wife refused. If bachelor friends
arc shouldered out of the house, all
female friends are forbidden anything
like an intimate footing, save those
few whom the wife thinks specially
devoted to herself and of whom she is
not Jealous. And they are very few.
There are perhaps no women ia the
world so exclusive toward their hus-
bands as are EDglishwomen. A hus-
band is bound to one woman only, no
doubt: but she thinks him also
bound to have no affection whatso-
ever outside the house and family.
IF he meets an intelligent woman,
pleasant to talk to, of agreeable man
ners and ready wit, and If he talks to
her in consequence with anything like
persistency or interest, be Offends
against the unwritten law and his
wife, whose utmost power of CONVEX
sation consists in putting in yes or
no with tolerable accurancy of aim,
thinks herself sighted and in-used.
She may be young and pretty, and
daa-iv loved Cor bor ovw oo1al Cva1