Books: Married Life; Its Shadows and Sunshine

T >> T.S. Arthur >> Married Life; Its Shadows and Sunshine

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Several years have passed since that ever-to-be-remembered, happy
visit to Cape May. Not once since have I attempted any management of
my husband, and yet it is a rare thing that my wish is not, as it
used to be before we were married, his law. It is wonderful, too,
how he has improved. I am sure he is not the same man that he was
five years ago. But, perhaps, I see with different eyes. At any
rate, I am not the same woman; or, if the same, very unlike what I
then was.

So much for my efforts to manage a husband. Of the three ways so
faithfully tried, my fair readers will be at no loss to determine
which is best. I make these honest confessions for the good of my
sex. My husband, Mr. John Smith, will be no little surprised if this
history should meet his eye. But I do not believe it will interrupt
the present harmonious relations existing between us, but rather
tend to confirm and strengthen them.

RULING A WIFE.

AS a lover, Henry Lane was the kindest, most devoted,
self-sacrificing person imaginable. He appeared really to have no
will of his own, so entire was his deference to his beautiful
Amanda; yet, for all this, he had no very high opinion of her as an
intelligent being. She was lovely, she was gentle, she was good; and
these qualities, combined with personal grace and beauty, drew him
in admiration to her side, and filled him with the desire to possess
her as his own.

As a husband, Henry Lane was a different being. His relation had
changed, and his exterior changed correspondingly. Amanda was his
wife; and as such she must be, in a certain sense, under him. It was
his judgment that must govern in all matters; for her judgment, in
the affairs of life, was held in light estimation. Moreover, as a
man, it was his province to control and direct and her duty to look
to him for guidance.

Yet, for all this, if the truth must be told, the conclusions of
Amanda's mind were, in ordinary affairs, even more correct than her
husband's judgment; for he was governed a great deal by impulses and
first impressions, instead of by the reason of which he was so
proud, while she came naturally into the woman's quick perceptions
of right and propriety. This being the case, it may readily be seen
that there was a broad ground-work for unhappiness in the married
state. Amanda could not sink into a mere cipher; she could not give
up her will entirely to the guidance of another, and cease to act
from her own volitions.

It took only a few months to make the young wife feel that her
position was to be one of great trial. She was of a mild and gentle
character, more inclined to suffer than resist; but her judgment was
clear, and she saw the right or wrong of any act almost
instinctively. Love did not make her blind to every thing in her
husband. He had faults and unpleasant peculiarities, and she saw
them plainly, and often desired to correct them. But one trial of
this kind sufficed to keep her silent. He was offended, and showed
his state of mind so plainly, that she resolved never to stand in
that relation to him again.

As time progressed, the passiveness of Amanda encouraged in Lane his
natural love of ruling. His household was his kingdom, and there his
will must be the law. In his mind arose the conceit that, in every
thing, his judgment was superior to that of his wife: even in the
smaller matters of household economy, he let this be seen. His
taste, too, was more correct, and applied itself to guiding and
directing her into a proper state of dressing. He decided about the
harmony of colours and the choice of patterns. She could not buy
even a ribbon without there being some fault found with it, as not
possessing the elements of beauty in just arrangements. In company,
you would often hear him say--"Oh, my wife has no taste. She would
dress like a fright if I did not watch her all the time."

Though outwardly passive or concurrent when such things were said,
Amanda felt them as unjust, and they wounded her more or less
severely, according to the character of the company in which she
happened at the time to be; but her self-satisfied husband saw
nothing of this. And not even when some one, more plainly spoken
than others, would reply to such a remark--"She did not dress like a
fright before you were married," did he perceive his presumption and
his errors.

But passiveness under such a relation does not always permanently
remain; it was accompanied from the first by a sense of oppression
and injustice, though love kept the feeling subdued. The desire for
ruling in any position gains strength by activity. The more the
young wife yielded, the more did the husband assume, until at length
Amanda felt that she had no will of her own, so to speak. The con-
viction of this, when it formed itself in her mind, half
involuntarily brought with it an instinctive feeling of resistance.
Here was the forming point of antagonism--the beginning of the state
of unhappiness foreshadowed from the first. Had Amanda asserted her
right to think and act for herself in the early days of her married
life, the jar of discord would have been light. It now promised to
be most afflicting in its character.

The first activity of Amanda's newly forming state showed itself in
the doing of certain things to which she was inclined,
notwithstanding the expression of her husband's disapproval.
Accustomed to the most perfect compliance, Mr. Lane was disturbed by
this.

"Oh, dear! what a horrid looking thing!" said he one day, as he
discovered a new dress pattern which his wife had just purchased
lying on a chair. "Where in the world did that come from?"

"I bought it this morning," replied Amanda.

"Take it back, or throw it into the fire," was the husband's rude
response.

"I think it neat," said Amanda, smiling.

"Neat? It's awful! But you've no taste. I wish you'd let me buy your
dresses."

The wife made no answer to this. Lane said a good deal more about
it, to all of which Amanda opposed but little. However, her mind was
made up to one thing, and that was to take it to the mantuamaker's.
The next Lane saw of the dress was on his wife.

"Oh, mercy!" he exclaimed, holding up his hand, "I thought you had
burnt it. Why did you have it made up?"

"I like it," quietly answered Mrs. Lane.

"You like any thing."

"I haven't much taste, I know," said Amanda, "but such as it is, it
is pleasant to gratify it sometimes."

Something in the way this remark was made it disturbed the
self-satisfaction which was a leading feature in Mr. Lane's state of
mind; he, however, answered--"I wish you would be governed by me in
matters of this kind; you know my taste is superior to yours. Do
take off that dress, and throw it in the fire."

Amanda did not reply to this, for it excited feelings and produced
thoughts that she had no wish to manifest. But she did not comply
with her husband's wishes. She liked the dress and meant to wear it,
and she did wear it, notwithstanding her husband's repeated
condemnation of her taste.

At this time they had one child--a babe less than a year old. From
the first, Lane had encroached upon the mother's province. This had
been felt more sensibly than any thing else by his wife, for it
disturbed the harmonious activity of the natural law which gives to
a mother the perception of what is best for her infant. Still, she
had been so in the habit of yielding to the force of his will, that
she gave way to his interference here in numberless instances,
though she as often felt that he was wrong as right. Conceit of his
own intelligence blinded him to the intelligence of others. Of this
Amanda became more and more satisfied every day. At first, she had
passively admitted that he knew best; but her own common sense and
clear perceptions soon repudiated this idea. While his love of
predominance affected only herself, she could bear it with great
patience; but when it was exercised, day after day, and week after
week, in matters pertaining to her babe, she grew restless under the
oppression.

After the decided, position taken in regard to her dress, Amanda's
mind acquired strength in a new direction. A single gratification of
her own will, attained in opposition to the will of her husband,
stirred a latent desire for repeated gratifications; and it was not
long before Lane discovered this fact, and wondered at the change
which had taken place in his wife's temper. She no longer acquiesced
in every suggestion, nor yielded when he opposed argument to an
assumed position. The pleasure of thinking and acting for herself
had been restored, and the delight appertaining to its indulgence
was no more to be suppressed. Her husband's reaction on this state
put her in greater freedom; for it made more distinctly manifest the
quality of his ruling affection, and awoke in her mind a more
determined spirit of resistance.

Up to this time, even in the most trifling matters of domestic and
social life, Lane's will had been the law. This was to be so no
longer. A new will had come into activity; and that will a woman's
will. Passive it had been for a long time under a pressure that
partial love and a yielding temper permitted to remain; but its
inward life was unimpaired; and when its motions became earnest, it
was strong and enduring. The effort made by Lane to subdue these
motions the moment he perceived them, only gave them a stronger
impulse. The hand laid upon her heart to quiet its pulsations only
made it beat with a quicker effort, while it communicated its
disturbance to his own.

The causes leading to the result we are to describe have been fully
enough set forth; they steadily progressed until the husband and
wife were in positions of direct antagonism. Lane could not give up
his love of controlling every thing around him, and his wife, fairly
roused to opposition, followed the promptings of her own will, in
matters where right was clearly on her side, with a quiet
perseverance that always succeeded. Of course, they were often made
unhappy; yet enough forbearance existed on both sides to prevent an
open rupture--at least, for a time. That, however, came at last, and
was the more violent from the long accumulation of reactive forces.

The particulars of this rupture we need not give; it arose in a
dispute about the child when she was two years old. As usual, Lane
had attempted to set aside the judgment of his wife in something
pertaining to the child, as inferior to his own, and she had not
submitted. Warm words ensued, in which he said a good deal about a
wife's knowing her place and keeping it.

"I am not your slave!" said Amanda, indignantly; the cutting words
of her husband throwing her off her guard.

"You are my wife," he calmly and half contemptuously replied; "and,
as such, are bound to submit yourself to your husband."

"To my husband's intelligence, not to his mere will," answered
Amanda, less warmly, but more resolutely than at first.

"Yes, to his will!" said Lane, growing blind from anger.

"That I have done long enough," returned the wife. "But the time is
past now. By your intelligence, when I see in it superior light to
what exists in my own, I will be guided, but, by your will--never!"

The onward moving current of years, which, for some time, had been
chafing amid obstructions, now met a sudden barrier, and flowed over
in a raging torrent. A sharp retort met this firm declaration of
Amanda, stinging her into anger, and producing a state of
recrimination. While in this state, she spoke plainly of his
assumption of authority over her from the first,--of her passiveness
for a time,--of being finally aroused to opposition.

"And now," she added, in conclusion, "I am content to be your wife
and equal, but will be no longer your passive and obedient slave."

"Your duty is to obey. You can occupy no other position as my wife,"
returned the blind and excited husband.

"Then we must part."

"Be it so." And as he said this, Lane turned hurriedly away and left
the house.

Fixed as a statue, for a long time, sat the stunned and wretched
wife. As the current of thoughts again flowed on, and the words of
her husband presented themselves in even a more offensive light than
when they were first uttered, indignant pride took the uppermost
place in her mind.

"He will not treat me as a wife and equal," she said, "and I will no
longer be his slave."

In anger Lane turned from his wife; and for hours after parting with
her this anger burned with an all-consuming flame. For him to yield
was out of the question. His manly pride would never consent to
this. She must fall back into her true position. He did not return
home, as usual, at dinner-time; but absented himself, in order to
give her time for reflection, as well as to awaken her fears lest he
would abandon her altogether. Towards night, imagining his wife in a
state of penitence and distressing anxiety, and feeling some
commiseration for her on that account, Mr. Lane went back to his
dwelling. As he stepped within the door, a feeling of desertion and
loneliness came over him; and unusual silence seemed to pervade the
house. He sat down in the parlour for some minutes; but hearing no
movement in the chamber above, nor catching even a murmur of his
child's voice, a sound for which his ears were longing, he ascended
the stairs, but found no one there. As he turned to go down again he
met a servant.

"Where is Mrs. Lane?" he asked.

"I don't know," was answered. "She went out this morning, and has
not returned."

"Where is Mary?"

"She took Mary with her."

"Didn't she say where she was going?"

"No, sir."

Mr. Lane asked no more questions, but went back into the room from
which he had just emerged, and, sitting down, covered his face with
his hands, and endeavoured to collect his thoughts.

"Has she deserted me?" he asked of himself in an audible husky
whisper.

His heart grew faint in the pause that followed. As the idea of
desertion became more and more distinct, Mr. Lane commenced
searching about in order to see whether his wife had not left some
communication for him, in which her purpose was declared. But he
found none. She had departed without leaving a sign. The night that
followed was a sleepless one to Lane. His mind was agitated by many
conflicting emotions. For hours, on the next day, he remained at
home, in the expectation of seeing or hearing from Amanda. But no
word came. Where had she gone? That was the next question. If he
must go in search of hers in what direction should he turn his
steps? She had no relations in the city, and with those who resided
at a distance she had cultivated no intimacy.

The whole day was passed in a state of irresolution. To make the
fact known was to expose a family difficulty that concerned only
himself and wife; and give room for idle gossip and gross
detraction. Bad as the case was, the public would make it appear a
great deal worse than the reality. In the hope of avoiding this, he
concealed the sad affair for the entire day, looking, in each
recurring hour, for the return of his repentant wife. But he looked
in vain. Night came gloomily down, and she was still absent.

He was sitting, about eight o'clock in the evening, undetermined yet
what to do, when a gentleman with whom he was but slightly
acquainted named Edmondson, called at the door and asked to see him.

On being shown in, the latter, with some embarrassment in his
manner, said--

"I have called to inform you, that Mrs. Lane has been at my house
since yesterday."

"At _your_ house!"

"Yes. She came there yesterday morning; and, since that time, my
wife has been doing her best to induce her to return home. But, so
far, she has not been able to make the smallest impression. Not
wishing to become a party to the matter, I have called to see you on
the subject. I regret, exceedingly, that any misunderstanding has
occurred, and do not intend that either myself or family shall take
sides in so painful an affair. All that I can do, however, to heal
the difficulty, shall be done cheerfully."

"What does she say?" asked Lane, when he had composed himself.

"She makes no specific complaint."

"What does she propose doing?"

"She avows her intention of living separate from you, and supporting
herself and child by her own efforts."

This declaration aroused a feeling of indignant pride in the
husband's mind. "It is my child as well as hers," said he. "She may
desert me, if she will; but she cannot expect me to give up my
child. To that I will never submit."

"My dear sir," said Mr. Edmondson, "do not permit your mind to
chafe, angrily, over this unhappy matter. That will widen not heal,
the breach. In affairs of this kind, pardon me for the remark, there
are always faults on both sides; and the duty of each is to put away
his or her own state of anger and antagonism and seek to reconcile
the other, rather than to compel submission. As a man, you have the
advantage of a stronger and clearer judgment,--exercise it as a man.
Feeling and impulse often rule in a woman's mind, from the very
nature of her mental conformation; and we should remember this when
we pass judgment on her actions. There is often more honour in
yielding a point than in contending for it to the end, in the face
of threatened disaster. Let me then urge you to seek a
reconciliation, while there is yet opportunity, and permit the veil
of oblivion to fall, while it may, over this painful event. As yet,
the fact has not passed from the knowledge of myself and wife. Heal
the breach, and the secret remains where it is."

"If she will return, I will receive her, and forgive and forget all.
Will you say this to her from me?"

"Why not go to her at once? See her face to face. This is the best
and surest way."

"No," said Lane, coldly. "She has left me of her own choice; and,
now, she must return. I gave her no cause for the rash act. Enough
for me that I am willing to forgive and forget all this. But I am
not the man to humble myself at the feet of a capricious woman. It
is not in me."

"Mr. Lane, you are wrong!" said the visitor, in a decided tone. "All
wrong. Do you believe that your wife would have fled from you
without a real or imagined cause?"

"No. But the cause is only in her imagination."

"Then see her and convince her of this. It is the same to her, at
present, whether the cause be real or imaginary. She believes it
real, and feels all its effects as real. Show her that it is
imaginary, and all is healed."

Lane shook his head.

"I have never humbled myself before a man, much less a woman," said
he.

This remark exhibited to Mr. Edmondson the whole ground-work of the
difficulty. Lane regarded a woman as inferior to a man, and had for
her, in consequence, a latent feeling of contempt. He could
understand, now, why his wife had left him; for he saw, clearly,
that, with such an estimation of woman, he would attempt to degrade
her from her true position; and, if she possessed an independent
spirit, render her life wellnigh insupportable. Earnestly did he
seek to convince Lane of his error; but to no good effect. As soon
as all doubt was removed from the mind of the latter in regard to
where his wife had gone, and touching the spirit which governed her
in her separation from him, his natural pride and
self-esteem--self-respect, he called it--came back into full
activity. No, he would never humble himself to a woman! That was the
unalterable state of his mind. If Amanda would return, and assume
her old place and her old relation, he would forget and forgive all.
This far he would go, and no farther. She had left of her own free
will, and that must bring her back.

"You can say all this to her in any way you please; but I will not
seek her and enter into an humble supplication for her return. I
have too much self-respect--and am too much of a man--for that. If
she finds the struggle to do so hard and humiliating, she will be
the more careful how she places herself again in such a position.
The lesson will last her a life-time."

"You are wrong; depend upon it, you are wrong!" urged Mr. Edmondson.
"There must be yielding and conciliation on both sides."

"I can do no more than I have said. Passive I have been from the
first, and passive I will remain. As for our child, I wish you to
say to her, that I shall not consent to a separation. It is my child
as much as hers; moreover, as father, my responsibility is greatest,
and I am not the man to delegate my duties to another. Possession of
the child, if driven to that extremity, I will obtain through aid of
the law. This I desire that she shall distinctly understand. I make
no threat. I do not wish her to view the declaration in that light.
I affirm only the truth, that she may clearly understand all the
consequences likely to flow from her ill-advised step."

The more Mr. Edmondson sought to convince Mr. Lane of his error, the
more determinedly did he cling to it; and he retired at last, under
the sad conviction that the unhappy couple had seen but the
beginning of troubles.

Alone with his own thoughts, an hour had not elapsed before Mr. Lane
half repented of his conduct in taking so unyielding a position. A
conviction forced itself upon his mind that he had gone too far and
was asking too much; and he wished that he had not been quite so
exacting in his declarations to Mr. Edmondson. But, having made
them, his false pride of consistency prompted him to adhere to what
he had said.

The night passed in broken and troubled sleep; and morning found him
supremely wretched. Yet resentment still formed a part of Mr. Lane's
feelings. He was angry with his wife, whom he had driven from his
side, and was in no mood to bend in order to effect a
reconciliation. At mid-day he returned from his business, hoping to
find her at home. But his house was still desolate. With the evening
he confidently expected her, but she was not there. Anxiously he
sat, hour after hour, looking for another visit from Mr. Edmondson,
but he came not again.

In leaving her husband's house, Mrs. Lane had gone, as has been
seen, to the house of a friend. Mrs. Edmondson was an old school
companion, between whom and herself had continued to exist, as they
grew up, the tenderest relations. When she turned from her husband,
she fled, with an instinct of affection and sympathy, to this
friend, and poured her tears in a gild agony of affliction upon her
bosom. In leaving her husband, she was not governed by a sudden
caprice; nor was the act intended to humble him to her feet. Nothing
of this was in her mind. He had trenched upon her province as a wife
and mother; interfered with her freedom as an individual; and, at
last, boldly assumed the right to command and control her as an
inferior. The native independence of her character, which had long
fretted under this rule of subordination, now openly rebelled, and,
panting for freedom, she had sprung from her fetters with few
thoughts as to future consequences.

The first day of absence was a day of weeping. Mrs. Edmondson could
not and did not approve of what had been done.

"I am afraid, Amanda, that you have only made matters worse," said
she, as soon as she could venture to suggest any thing at all upon
the subject. "It is always easier to prevent than to heal a breach.
The day has not yet closed. There is time to go back. Your husband
need never know what has been in your mind. This hasty act may be
entirely concealed from him."

But the long suffering wife had been roused to opposition. A new
current of feeling was sweeping across and controlling her mind. She
was, therefore, deaf to the voice of reason. Still her friend, as in
duty bound, urged her to think more calmly on the subject, and to
retrace the steps she had taken. But all was in vain. This being so,
her husband, as has been seen, called upon Mr. Lane, and informed
him that his wife was at his house. From this interview Mr.
Edmondson returned disheartened, and reported all that had been said
on both sides to his wife.

"My husband saw Mr. Lane last evening," said Mrs. Edmondson to
Amanda on the next day.

"He did!" Amanda looked eagerly into the face of her friend, while
she became much agitated.

"Yes. He called to let him know that you were here."

"What did he say?"

"He wishes you to return. All will be forgotten and forgiven."

"He said that?"

"Yes."

"I have done nothing for which I desire forgiveness," said Amanda,
coldly, and with the air of one who is hurt by the words of another.
"If he will not have me return as his wife and equal, I can never go
back."

"For the sake of your child, Amanda, you should be willing to bear
much."

"My child shall not grow, up and see her mother degraded."

"She is his child as well as yours. Do not forget that," said Mrs.
Edmondson. "And it is by no means certain that he will permit you to
retain the possession of an object so dear to him."

The face of Mrs. Lane instantly flushed at this, a suggestion which
had not before been presented to her mind.

"Did he refer to this subject in conversing with your husband?"
inquired Amanda, with forced calmness.

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