[The _Spectator_ warns men against marrying simpletons,
pointing out that "there is no bore on earth equal to the
woman who can neither talk nor listen, and who has no mental
interests in common with her husband."]
[Illustration]
When fair BELINDA sweetly smiles,
And airily before you trips,
You're captured by her artless wiles,
And must admire her rosy lips.
You know that she is very fair,
You see that she has splendid eyes;
But ah, rash lover, have a care,
And find out if BELINDA's wise.
For beauty, trust us, is not all
A wife in these days should possess;
Her conversation's apt to pall,
If she can talk of naught but dress.
She need not be too deeply read,
You do not want a priggish bride;
But still take care the pretty head
Can boast some little brain inside.
In courtship all she said was sweet,
For you had died to win a glance;
Her little platitudes seemed neat,
Breathed 'mid the pauses of the dance.
You would have felt a heartless fiend
To criticise, when by her side;
Nor would the lady have demeaned
Herself to answer, had you tried.
But when you've won her for a wife,
And ante-nuptial glamour dies,
What food for matrimonial strife
Her crass inconsequent replies.
How terrible to find her dense,
And never grasping what you mean;
You'll think one gleam of common sense
Worth more than finest eyes e'er seen.
Days come when love no longer gives
Illusions as in hours of yore;
And hapless is the man who lives
To find his wife become a bore.
Then keep, if you'd avoid that day,
The wise _Spectator's_ golden rule:
Don't be by beauty led away,
And choose for wife a pretty fool.
* * * * *
In the _Times'_ book advertisement column, the S.P.C.K. announces the
following new publication:--
THE OUSE. By the Rev. A.J. FOSTER, M.A.
This, we suppose, is the first of a new unaspirated ARRY SERIES.
The next Volume being _The Ome_, and, after that, _Books of Ighgate,
Amsted, Olloway, and other Ills_.
* * * * *