A hated Wife was sent to relatives as a test. She said the Shepard hated her. The Husband commented that she must also be hated by those with her all day.
Make the best of a bad situation.
Townsend version
A man had a Wife who made herself hated by all the members of his household. Wishing to find out if she had the same effect on the persons in her father’s house, he made some excuse to send her home on a visit to her father. After a short time she returned, and when he inquired how she had got on and how the servants had treated her, she replied, “The herdsmen and shepherds cast on me looks of aversion.” He said, “O Wife, if you were disliked by those who go out early in the morning with their flocks and return late in the evening, what must have been felt towards you by those with whom you passed the whole day!”
Moral
Straws show how the wind blows.
L’Estrange version (An Unhappy Match)
There was a man, a long time ago, that had got a shrew to his wife, and there could be no quiet in the house for her. The husband was willing however to make the best of a bad game, and so for experiment sake, he sent her away for a while to her fathers. When he came a little after to take her home again, Prethee sweet-heart (says he) how go matters in the house where thou hast been? Introth, says she, they go I know not how: but there’s none of the family, you must know, can endure me: no not so much as the very hinds and plough-men; I could read it in the faces of them. Ah wife I says the husband, if people that rise early and come home late, and are all day out of your sight, cannot be quiet for ye, what a case is your poor husband in, that must spend his whole life in your company.
Moral
When man and wife cannot agree, prudence will oblige the one, and modesty the other, to put all their little controversies into their pockds, and make the best of a bad game.
Gherardo Image from 1480
Uxor Morosa et Vir Eius
Erat nupta cum quodam mulier iracunda et morositate intolerabilis toti familiae. Hic cognoscendi cupidus utrum suane tantummodo, an etiam paterna domus ferre illam nequiret, bona cum gratia quasi magna res agatur, ad patrem eam remittit. Post dies non multos revocatam interrogat quam recte sibi cum familia paterna convenisset. “Bubulci,” inquit illa, “et pastores mihi visi sunt offendi mea praesentia.” Ibi vir, exclamans, “Mulier,” inquit, “si gravis et invisa iis fuisti qui prima luce domo egrediuntur et eadem postrema revertuntur, quid de aliis suspicandum cum quibus totus dies versata es?”
Perry #095
