Page:The Galaxy, Volume 5.djvu/316

304 that it cost him twenty years of laborious life to complete his colossal undertaking, with such an incumbrance upon his assiduity!

Upon the strength of a very brief acquaintance, the poet Wycherley married the Countess of Drogheda, a gushing widow, who had both money and good looks. Would that we could say she had an amiable disposition as well. But this we cannot say. Losing Court favor, the poet lost therewith the sunshine of his domestic life; for, instead of supplying the mishap by a genial temper and the sensible expenditure of her abundant means, the ci-devant Countess rendered Wycherley's misery superlative by her conduct and conversation. Macaulay thus admirably sums up the case: "Lady Drogheda was ill-tempered, imperious, and extravagantly jealous. She had herself been a maid of honor at Whitehall. She well knew in what estimation conjugal fidelity was held among the fine gentlemen there, and watched her town husband as assiduously as Mr. Pinchwife watched his country wife. The unfortunate wit was, indeed, allowed to meet his friends at a tavern opposite to his own house. But on such occasions the windows were always open, in order that her ladyship, who was posted on the other side of the street, might be satisfied that no woman was of the party. The death of Lady Drogheda released the poet from this distress; but a series of disasters, in rapid succession, broke down his health, his spirits, and his fortune. His wife meant to leave him a good property, and left him only a lawsuit." Many years afterward, at seventy-five, Wycherley, to spite his nephew, married a young girl; but his honeymoon was a short one, and, before ten days had elapsed, the old bridegroom was summoned to the place where they neither marry nor are given in marriage, and where shrews are de trop.

A first-class shrew, essentially, was Sarah, Duchess of Marlborough; although, mayhap, her soldierly lord was less the victim of her temper than were those who endured its fuller force after the Duke's death had left her no husband to worry. Handsome, high-strung, ambitious, and talented, she was none the less arrogant, irascible, and over-bearing; so much so, indeed, that Alison found it problematical whether she aided her husband's fortunes in after life most, by her influence at Court, or marred them by the supercilious demeanor which involved her in continual quarrels, and, at length, entirely alienated the affections of his sovereign. Taking offence one day at the Duke, she determined to punish him, and, knowing how proud he was of her beautiful tresses, she sheared them all off in her fury, and placed them where he could not fail to notice them, in the hope of vexing him. But hate's labor was lost; for the great man, who always loved her far better than she deserved, made no ado over the matter; and, after years had passed, and he with them, the spiteful creature discovered the