WIVES WHO ARE SHREWS.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LII, Issue 127, 26 June 1909, Page 4

WIVES WHO ARE SHREWS.

HOME HAPPINESS HINTS. Some women are shrews by nature, just as s'ome men are born with tempers 50 volcanic that one can scarcely live ia the same house with them. But we are only dealing with the women who become shrews after marriage. There arc two. main causes: (1) The wife is too exacting; and (2) the husband is not always so straightforward as lie ought to be. A little quantity of thes'e two failings commences the development of the shrew. WHEN HUSBANDS COME HOME

LATE. If it were possible to take a vote on the subject, it would doubtless be found that a large proportion of those married couples who "do not get on" could trace the germ of unhappiness in the wife's demand for extreme regularity in all things on the part of the husband. If he arrives home in the evening just a few minutes later than his usual time, she looks black and asks what he has been doing. He may reach home exact to time every day .for a month, and then be late for once; he will receive the same chilly welcome. She takes it as a personal injury. If the husband grumbles because his meal is not ready the very moment he appears, then he must expect to be scolded in turn; but it often happens that lie is quite ready to wait a little while and yet is grumbled at for being a trifle behind time.

On the other hand, the husband often arrives home late without reasonable grounds for the delay. , 11 is 100 frequently the case that,a man forgets that his wife is -wailiii" at home for him, and spends time with a companion when lie should be devoting it to his life partner. In fiich circumstances he may advance the old excuse; after a while, his wife discovers that he is not kept at work, and then the trouble commences. SLAVES IX THE HOUSE.

It is not only in the matter of coming home that the wife becomes too exacting; she limits him in the house in all kinds of wavs.

Women call thi'inselves house slaves', but there are some who are slaves of the house in n dill'erent sense. They will have everything kept so precise that it is almost painful to be in the home. _ No chair must be awry, he must not go into this particular room except in slippers, he must leave nolhiug on the shelf, and so forth. He is scolded for the least infraction of these rules, and in time (being human) replies with some lack of elegance. Men, it is true, are frequently less considerate than they should be, but they are easily managed if a woman goes' the right way to work. Scolding and grumbling seldom prove effective.