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IN the far-famed collection of anecdotes, by Joe Miller, are to be found many of actual occurrence, and withal pregnant with information and valuable instruction. To numbers of my fair readers, however, that veritable compilation is, no doubt, a sealed book, therefore the subject matter of the present paper, which has often struck me as furnishing sufficient food for both a sermon and a satire, will possess the same novelty in their eyes as would an original tale, although it be derived from the above-mentioned pages. My object in adopting it is to vindicate the cause of female independence, and to show that all do not consider them inferior to man in the scale of civilised society.

The property of Mr. Heneage Valancourt, the hero of my tale, consisting of several shares in some extensive manufactories near Manchester, he thought he could not do better than fix his residence, on becoming a married man, in the picturesque vicinity of Rochdale, as by that means he secured the double advantage of country air, and of remaining within two hours' ride of his place of business. The object of his hymeneal selection was Miss Fanny Moldhurst, a young lady of moderate fortune, many charms, and much good sense. To these were added superior accomplishments and very pleasing manners. The courtship had been conducted on the usual plan, where the pretensions are equal, and the relations on either side favourably inclined. The youth was introduced to the lady at the house of a friend, and in half an hour discovered her to be the most agreeable person it had ever been his fortune to meet. She sung to him, and he accompanied her on the guitar, which he touched with a masterly hand. They played chess together, and so interested

D D-VOL. XI.-SEPTEMBER.

did he at length become, that when he lost the game he lost his heart. Of course, on making this discovery, he sought the papa of his enslaver, and so well were matters pursued, that in another month, if a male and female form were observed in the lover-like hour of twilight, stealing together along a sequestered path, they were instantly pronounced to be Heneage Valancourt and his intended bride.

"Ah! how fortunate!" some may exclaim, but not so we: the lessons of experience have taught us that the affections can never be permanently established until they have first been tried, and that a few doubts, fears, crosses, and misunderstandings are as essential to the formation of lasting love as is the rain with the sunshine to the growth of a flower. This may seem strange philosophy to those fair misses whose bread-and-butter notions of the passion depict it as an eternal spring without a shower-a creation where sun and roses only are to be seen; but let them attend to the moral of our tale, and we will soon convince them of the soundness of our doctrine.

The dawnings of love soon attained the meridian of felicity; and in the brightest hour of their existence the lovers were married. Never was joy more complete; it had been born in hope, nursed by certainty, and had reached its maturity without a single disappointment. Was not this a brilliant state of things?—it was, but too brilliant to be lasting! Valancourt's was a mind easily operated upon by specious reasoning, and, however ardent he might be in any pursuit, he was to be diverted from it in an instant by persons possessing the smallest influence over him, provided the arguments they employed had a show of plausibility, and were directed against

his self-esteem. It was thus his happiness with Fanny became interrupted. Several months were passed in the interchange of every endearment, and the blissful husband thought it no sacrifice to yield himself entirely to one whose sole object was to preserve him from the approach of ennui. His indulgence was, however, regarded as a weakness by an old maiden aunt, named Withers, who, envying that sway in another which she had herself flirted a life through, without success, to acquire, took every opportunity of alarming her nephew's pride upon the subject, and of impressing upon him the unmanliness of being what she termed "hen-pecked."

"You are too conceding," said this antiquated piece of mischief to him one day when they were alone. "You let Mrs. Valancourt possess her own way in every thing, and in another year or two I shan't expect to hear you call your soul

"Really, aunt," returned Heneage, 'you must be mistaken. I don't know that Fanny has opposed my will in any instance of consequence. I go where I like, I do what I please; and, as to matters of business, she is too studious regarding my comforts to interfere with them."

"Fiddle faddle! you are too well fortified for her to make an open assault; but there is such a thing as sapping and mining."

open

"Possibly; but when every movement of the enemy, so to speak, is to inspection, what is there to fear?" "Every thing," said Miss Withers; "I understand the arts of my own sex too thoroughly, and know that when they appear most candid, they are most intent upon deceiving."

"Am I to accept that as an axiom which includes yourself in its sweeping range?" enquired Valancourt.

"Pooh! am I your wife? or have I any purpose to effect, save that of not seeing you imposed upon?" returned his aunt, snappishly.

Proceed," said her nephew, as a smile passed across his cheek.

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'Well, then," said she, smoothing down her black silk apron, and fiddling with a gold chain round her neck, to which was appended the miniature of a pale-faced and cross-eyed young man,

who had paid his addresses to her at least half a century before. "It is the ambition of every woman to exercise the sovereignty of INFLUENCE. For this object they will barter the submission of years; and so that they gain their ends, they heed not how it may uproot the dearest enjoyments of their dupes." *" As

"Ahem!" coughed Heneage. suming my present peace of mind to be founded on delusion, it yet forms my best enjoyment; consequently, you will prove yourself one of the very beings you describe, if you make any further attempts to disturb me in its possession." As he concluded this discharge of popgun artillery against his revered relation, Valancourt rose and walked stiffly to the window, whistling, as he went, the fag end of an old air, to which, had he added the words, he would have sung—

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White, black, she can paint-
Make the devil a saint,

And change to an owl a maccaw."

Hereupon Miss Withers also rose with offended dignity, and moving first one hip, and then another, with unwonted briskness, sarcastically said: “Oh, pray be not alarmed; I would not for worlds disturb the pretty puppet in its interesting curvettings. I did think to prevent it from being sneered at by its acquaintance as a henpecked husband; but now its wife may jerk its head off, before I will again open my mouth."

"Surely, aunt, you cannot be serious," said Valancourt, a little stung by this rejoinder; "how often am I to repeat, that I have my own way in every thing?”

"You have not," said Miss Withers. "It was only last night that you told me you were going to the concert, yet the moment you heard your wife express a wish for an excursion on the water, you relinquished your design, and covered your hands with blisters by rowing her about until nearly eleven o'clock."

"And what of that? She did not hear me form any prior arrangement, and I experienced far more pleasure in her smiles and conversation, amid the refreshing coolness of the evening air, and enchanting brightness of the harvest moon, than I could have in a crowded room, where ten to one but what the

strains of Mozart, Beethoven, and Rossini, became subjected to every species of melodicide."

"You put one out of all patience!" exclaimed Miss Withers. "You had better tell me that she was ignorant of your having accepted the invitation of Mr. Sharkfish, the attorney, last week, when she prevailed upou you to plead a former engagement, and relinquish the opportunity of cementing an intimacy with him."

"But she knew that I did not approve of the man's principles," said Valancourt," and she did but persuade me to an exercise of that firmness in the rejection of his advances, which I ought, in the first instance, to have displayed of my own accord."

"Ah! I see that if I stay here talking all night, I shall do no good, therefore I will depart. One farewell word of advice, however; yield as often as you please to the first expressed wishes of Mrs. Valancourt; but when you have previously formed a resolution of your own, act upon it in every instance with decision, otherwise you will forfeit the honourable dignity of your name; become the ridicule of your friends, an object of pity to your relatives, and be contemptible even in the eyes of your

own wife."

This harangue closed the conversation, and Miss Withers took her departure, leaving the poison she had malignantly administered to work its dread effect. This it did most successfully. Heneage at first became thoughtful, and then uneasy. All the sage precepts for young married men that he had ever read, crowded upon his memory. He recollected the banterings of his intimates when he was on the point of matrimony, and the manifold observations also of his sisters. "Heneage is too good-natured ever to insist upon having his own way," said one; "Ah!" cried another, "his wife will find it an easy matter to make him submit to petticoat government;" whilst a third gravely implored him to preserve his rights for the credit of the family, and not suffer the slightest infringement upon his authority; for, said she, "so sure as you recede, your wife will advance, and the footing once lost, will never be regained. Be assured, that it would be preferable to do violence to your own

feelings, than to form a laughing-stock for all the world." These and other reminiscences worried the youth more than he liked to confess even to his own conscience; and as he tossed and tumbled about the sofa on which he had thrown himself, he exclaimed aloud, "Pish!-plague take such impertinent interference! I wish the whole pack of aunts, cousins, sisters, mothers, and all other busy bodies, before they meddled with my affairs, had been sent headlong to-Paradise!"

These are not very nice expressions, but we record them as they were used. Still, however, he could not avoid attaching weight to the very admonitions which he condemned, and although he had delegated considerable authority to his wife, that he might indulge an indolence of disposition, which rendered thinking or acting for himself an irksome exertion; the fear of being laughed at was so great, that he now resolved to encounter those fatiguing exercises, rather than risk the odium of doing what every wedded man finds it so conducive to his happiness to do. He had scarcely made this notable decision, ere his amiable, and, in every sense of the word, better half, entered the drawingroom. Valancourt instantly prepared to act upon his new prejudices, and assuming a mighty ridiculous air of hauteur, continued to remain seated, instead of rising to welcome her from her visit abroad, as was his accustomed practice.

"Ah, my dear Heneage," said the young wife, seating herself by his side, and not remarking this departure from rule, "I'm so pleased to find you within. I want to consult you about going tomorrow evening

and playfully threatening Valancourt with her finger. "Do you hear that, sirrah? Your queen wills it, and dare to disobey her at your peril!"

"Madam, I have told you that I am engaged."

"And, Sir, I have told you that I will not hear of any engagement." At this moment Fanny remarked an expression in her husband's eye more than usually serious; but, attributing it to mere pretence, she bent over his shoulder with caresses as real as sportive, and said, "Ah! I see that the grand signor wants to be coaxed a little. Well, then, he shall be gratified. What shall his loving wife do to persuade him? Shall she sing to him?-Shall she give him one of her sweetest kisses? or shall she prattle until he grant her request?”

These blandishments were no longer resistible. Valancourt was about to cast down his newly-erected fabric of determination, when he became struck with a look of undisguised triumph on the features of his wife, who having watched every turn of her husband's countenance, had foreseen the concession he was about to make, and naturally indicated by the variation of her own face, and a short musical laugh, her joy at the conquest; but there was nothing of arrogance in the look or tone, nor aught, indeed, in any way calculated to wound the conquered; yet the predisposition of Heneage caused him to view this little ebullition of feeling in a distorted light; and once more arming himself with the buckler of opposition, he re-assumed a reserved air, and coldly said: "This is all idle nonsense, Fanny. I have said that I will not yield, and am inflexible." Twice did Fanny draw breath ere she ventured to reply to language so unusual - so unkindly delivered. That pause was sufficient to repress every sentiment of anger; and her reply was uttered with the utmost calmness.

"You must have some very important business," she said, "or weighty appointment, to render you so singularly invulnerable to my entreaties. Where is it you are going, love?"

Now, to say the truth, this was a question which Valancourt was not exactly prepared to answer, as he was actually without any kind of engage ment for the morrow. Recollecting,

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It does," said her husband.
"Positively?"
"Undoubtedly."

"Then," said she, laughing and clapping her hands," I shall gain my point at last; for the Benticks have already arranged to be of my party, and you will thus be enabled to fall into my schemes, and, at the same time, transact whatever business you had intended with my visiters."

"Madam," returned Valancourt, much annoyed at being thus overtaken, “I am not to be ensnared into complying with a request to which I have once given a negative. Do you take me for a weak slave fettered by your apron-string? You would have me give up all authority over my own domestics next. I insist that these idle arts may cease, and that, in fulfilling the duties of a wife, you learn not to intrench upon the mastership of your husband, or weaken confidence in his word, by rendering it as a broken reed."

It was an exercise of all the strength of mind he possessed that enabled Valancourt thus to deliver himself; but the summit of the hill of difficulty once attained, he found little trouble in making progress down the other side, until he reached the valley of real humiliation, but of fancied superiority, where he was made to taste the fruits of opposition, dissension, and unhappiness. To quit metaphor, his ridiculous assumption roused the pride and displeasure of his lady. It had never been her intention, her desire, to exercise the uncontrolled management of her husband, and, yielding as she had always found him, a declared wish on his part would have, at any time,