“Ye gods, I grow a talker!” Let us prate.
The next of perils, though I place it sternest,
Is when, without regard to Church or State,
A wife makes or takes love in upright earnest.
Abroad, such things decide few women’s fate—
(Such, early Traveller! is the truth thou learnest)—
But in old England, when a young bride errs,
Poor thing! Eve’s was a trifling case to hers.