Some would tell us that marriages are made in heaven,[234:A] but a sapient saw reminds us that "There is no marriage in heaven, neither is there always heaven in marriage."
Gossip, and the mischief-making that may too often accrue from imprudent loquacity, have at all times been so commonly attributed to the fair sex that we naturally find many such proverbs as these: "Silence is not the greatest vice of a woman"; "A woman conceals what she does not know"; "He that tells his wife news is but newly married." The words of Hotspur will be recalled:
"Constant you are, But yet a woman, and for secrecy No lady closer; for I well believe Thou wilt not utter what thou dost not know."
The writer of Ecclesiasticus declares that "As the climbing up a sandy way is to the feet of the aged, so is a wife full of words to a quiet man"; while in a MS. of the time of Henry V. we find the following quaint statement:--
"Two wymen in one howse, Two cattes and one mowse, Two dogges and one bone Maye never accorde in one."
Udall writes that "As the kynde of women is naturally geuen to the vyce of muche bablynge there is nothyng wherein theyr womanlynesse is more honestlie garnyshed than with sylence"; but a Welsh proverb declares that "A woman's strength is in her tongue,"[235:A] and we can scarcely be surprised that she is at times reluctant to forego the use of this weapon.
The Spaniards sarcastically assert that "He who is tired of a quiet life gets him a wife"; and Solomon, we recall, declares that "It is better to dwell in a corner of the house-top than with a brawling woman"; while another proverb bitterly, but truly, declares that "He fasts enough whose wife scolds all dinner-time"; and yet another hath it that "He that can abide a curst wife need not fear any"; so that an old writer breaks out:
"Why then I see to take a shrew (As seldome other there be few) Is not the way to thriue: So hard a thing I spie it is, The good to chuse, the shrew to mis, That feareth me to wiue."
This bitter feeling against womankind is seen not only in our proverbs, but very largely also in epitaphs, as for example:
"Here lies my wife, a sad slattern and shrew, If I said I respected her I should lie too."
"Here lies my wife, and, Heaven knows, Not less for mine than her repose."