Arizona republican., 1904-09-21
On Married Life.

brought out some shrewd comment and sound advice from the presiding su- preme court justice in a western state not long ago. The main complaints were "cruel and inhuman treatment" and ''incompatibility of temperament"
 According to the judges interpreta- ton of the evidence, the "cruel and in- human treatment" complained of by the wife seems to have consisted main ly of occasional exhibitions of boOrish- ness on the part of the husband. On one occasion he was bored with her piano playing, and attempted summar- fly to stop the annoyance by closing the lid of the instrument. His wife resisted, and her fingers were pinched in consequence. At another time he re- fused to budge from the two chairs he occupied in front of the window, to enable his wife to remove some pct birds which were hanging outside. A third specification related to the vio- lent ringing of the doorben at night by the husband. Acts like these were the head and front of the offending.
 There may have been evidence enough in the case, said the judge. to secure a verdict from a jury of women that the husband had behaved like "a brute.'. But then. the judge asked, had the wife's temper no share in mak- ing him SO? It was very wrong to close the piano on his wife's fingers. but was it quite right to insist on com pellng man to listen to music that he did not want? Is it wise to make a mans home so disagreeable that he must either seek quiet and repose out side of it or resort to force to secure them inside? As to the pet bird cpl sode, it would be interesting to hear in what kind of tones the wife asked her husband to move; and before con demning without reserve that morose and surly person, it might be only fair to give him some credit for a dim feel ing of regret that the woman he had courted in days gone by had love to spare for her birds. but none for him. Again. why should a wife's nerves he jared by her husbands ring at the doorbell, even if it were late at night :? There are women who find more mel ody in that sound than is contained in all the octaves of their pianofortes or all the trilIs of their pet birds.
 The old fashioned theory of mutual obligation in the marriage relation is a good deal lost sight of in these days. declared the judge. Men are too apt to carry their business faces and their business thoughts home with them, and so bring nothing but coldness, hard ness and reserve to the society of wives and children. On the other hand, wo- men are not ready enough to make aI- lowance for the wear and tear of bus mess life upon the nerves and tenn per of the man who has to bear the brunt of the struggle. It is to a very large extent for their wives and chiI- dren's sakes that men are tempted to overtax their energies, and to make themselves prematurely old, in the en- deavor to acquire wealth or to main tain certain social position. There are many things that cloud a mans brow and try his temper about which he cannot take his wife into confidence. She would probably not understand them if he did, and the attempt to translate these troubles into definite speech is to many men a more acute pain than simply to endure them. Wo- men may have noticed the fact that the boiling kettle continues to bubble for little after it has been lifted from the fire. In the same way the active brain of the hard worked professional or business man will, in spite of him. self, run on the affairs of his office af- ter he has come within the precincts of home. A wise wife will make allow ance for the occasional gruffness whose source she cannot understand, and will make it her business to smooth out the hard lines of the troubled face, and to allow the influence of a pleasant home to work it's gradual but certain cure.
 Of course, deeper than all faults of heedlessness or want of heart is the radical moral error of forgetting what the marriage covenant is, the judge reminded his hearers. People take in marriage certain duties on themselves and undertake to bear the infirmities of humanity which each possesses
 Whether flor better or for worse. for richer or poorer" is expressly covenant ed or not, the conditions are distinctly understood, and married people are so obviously bound to accommodate their tastes and tempers to each other as they are to respect the inviolabil of their neighbor's property They have no right to subject their children, if there are children. to the demoraliziig influences of a contentious home. or to the shame inseparable from a broken marriage bond. They have just as lit tie right to weaken the tie which holds society together by treating the mar riage VOW as a thing terminable at the caprice or the vindictive impulse of