PART II.

LOVES OF THE LAWYERS.

“I

CHAPTER VI.

A LOTTERY.

WOULD compare the multitude of women which

are to be chosen for wives unto a bag full of snakes, having among them a single eel; now if a man should put his hand into this bag, he may chance to light on the eel; but it is an hundred to one he shall be stung by a snake."

These words were often heard from the lips of that honest judge, Sir John More, whose son Thomas stirred from brain to foot by the bright eyes, and snowy neck, and flowing locks of cara Elizabetha (the cara Elizabetha of a more recent Tom More was 'Bessie, my darling') -penned those warm and sweetly-flowing verses which delight scholars of the present generation, and of which the following lines are neither the least musical nor the least characteristic:

nis darkened mind no more than a carnal appetite; and he strove to conquer the emotions which he feared would rouse within him a riot of impious passions. With fasting and cruel discipline he would fain have killed the devil that agitated him, whenever he passed a pretty girl in the street. As a lay Carthusian he wore a hair-shirt next his skin, disciplined his bare back with scourges, slept on the cold ground or a hard bench, and by a score other strong measures sought to preserve his spiritual by ruining his bodily health. But nature was too powerful for unwholesome doctrine and usage, and before he rashly took a celibatic vow, he knelt to fair Jane Colt-and rising, kissed her on the lips.

When spiritual counsel had removed his conscientious objections to matrimony, he could not condescend to marry for love, but must, forsooth, choose his wife in obedience to considerations of compassion and mercy. Loving her younger sister, he paid his addresses to Jane, because he shrunk from the injustice of putting the junior above the elder of the two girls. "Sir Thomas having determined, by the advice and direction of his ghostly father, to be a married man, there was at that time a pleasant conceited gentleman of an ancient family in Essex, one Mr. John Colt, of New Hall, that invited him into his house, being much delighted in his company, proffering unto him the choice of any of his daughters, who were young gentlewomen of very good carriage, good complexions, and very religiously inclined; whose honest and sweet conversation and virtuous education enticed Sir Thomas not a little; and although his affection most served him to the second, for that he thought her the

fairest and best favored, yet when he thought within himself that it would be a grief and some blemish to the eldest to have the younger sister preferred before her, he, out of a kind of compassion, settled his fancy upon the eldest, and soon after married her with all his friends' good liking."

The marriage was a fair happy union, but its duration was short. After giving birth to four children Jane died, leaving the young husband, who had instructed her sedulously, to mourn her sincerely. That his sorrow was poignant may be easily believed; for her death deprived him of a docile pupil, as well as a dutiful wife.

"Virginem duxit admodum puellam," Erasmus says of his friend," claro genere natam, rudem adhuc utpote ruri inter parentes ac sorores semper habitam, quo magis illi liceret illam ad suos mores fingere. Hanc et literis instruendam curavit, et omni musices genere doctam reddidit." Here is another insight into the considerations which brought about the marriage. When he set out in search of a wife, he wished to capture a simple, unsophisticated, untaught country girl, whose ignorance of the world should incline her to rely on his superior knowledge, and the deficiencies of whose intellectual training should leave him an ample field for educational experiments. Seeking this he naturally turned his steps. toward the eastern countries; and in Essex he found the young lady, who to the last learnt with intelligence and zeal the lessons which he set her.

More's second choice of a wife was less fortunate than his first. Wanting a woman to take care of his children and preside over his rather numerous establishment, he made an offer to a widow, named Alice Middleton. Plain and homely in appearance and taste, Mistress Alice would have been invaluable to Sir Thomas as a superior domestic servant, but his good judgment and taste de

is pained by her sharp, garrulous tongue, when its acerbity and virulence are turned against her pacific and scholarly husband. A smile follows the recollection that he endeavored to soften her manners and elevate her nature by a system of culture similar to that by which Jane Colt, admodum puella,' had been formed and raised into a polished gentlewoman. Past forty years of age, Mistress Alice was required to educate herself anew. Erasmus assures his readers that "though verging on old age, and not of a yielding temper," she was prevailed upon "to take lessons on the lute, the cithara, the viol, the monochord, and the flute, which she daily practised to him."

It has been the fashion with biographers to speak bitterly of this poor woman, and to pity More for his cruel fate in being united to a termagant. No one has any compassion for her. Sir Thomas is the victim; Mistress Alice the shrill virago. In these days, when every historic reprobate finds an apologist, is there no one to say a word in behalf of the Widow Middleton, whose lot in life and death seems to this writer very pitable? She was quick in temper, slow in brain, domineering, awkward. To rouse sympathy for such a woman is no easy task; but if wretchedness is a title to compassion, Mistress Alice has a right to charity and gentle usage. It was not her fault that she could not sympathize with her grand husband, in his studies and tastes, his lofty life and voluntary death; it was her misfortune that his steps traversed plains high above her own moral and intellectual level. By social theory they were intimate companions; in reality, no man and woman in all England

were wider apart. From his elevation he looked down on her with commiseration that was heightened by curiosity and amazement; and she daily writhed under his gracious condescension and passionless urbanity; under her own consciousness of inferiority and consequent selfscorn. He could no more sympathize with her petty aims, than she with the high views and ambitions; and conjugal sympathy was far more necessary to her than to him. His studious friends and clever children afforded him an abundance of human fellowship; his public cares and intellectual pursuits gave him constant diversion. He stood in such small need of her, that if some benevolent fairy had suddenly endowed her with grace, wisdom, and understanding, the sum of his satisfaction would not have been perceptibly altered. But apart from him she had no sufficient enjoyments. His genuine companionship was requisite for her happiness; but for this society nature had endowed her with no fitness. In the case of an unhappy marriage, where the unhappiness is not caused by actual misconduct, but is solely due to incongruity of tastes and capacities, it is cruel to assume that the superior person of the ill-assorted couple has the stronger claim to sympathy.

Finding his wife less tractable than he wished, More withheld his confidence from her, taking the most important steps of his life, without either asking for her advice, or even announcing the course which he was about to take. His resignation of the seals was announced to her on the day after his retirement from office, and in a manner which, notwithstanding its drollery, would greatly pain any woman of ordinary sensibility. The day following the date of his resignation was a holiday; and in accordance with his usage the ex-Chancellor, together with his household, attended service in Chelsea Church. On her way to church, Lady More returned the greetings of