Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, THE WANDERER: 3. IN ENGLAND: MATRIMONIAL COUNSELS, by EDWARD ROBERT BULWER-LYTTON


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

THE WANDERER: 3. IN ENGLAND: MATRIMONIAL COUNSELS, by                 Poet Analysis     Poet's Biography
First Line: You are going to marry my pretty relation
Last Line: And your worth not the best of your friends will disparage!
Alternate Author Name(s): Meredith, Owen; Lytton, 1st Earl Of; Lytton, Robert
Subject(s): England; Marriage; Travel; English; Weddings; Husbands; Wives; Journeys; Trips


YOU are going to marry my pretty relation,
My dove-like young cousin, so soft in the eyes,
You are entering on life's settled dissimulation,
And, if you'd be happy, in season be wise.

Take my counsel. The more that, in church, you are tempted
To yawn at the sermon, the more you'll attend.
The more you'd from milliner's bills be exempted,
The more on your wife's little wishes you'll spend.

You'll be sure, every Christmas, to send to the rector
A dozen of wine, and a hamper or two.
The more your wife plagues you, the more you'll respect her,
She'll be pleasing your friend, if she's not plaguing you.

For women of course, like ourselves, need emotion;
And happy the husband, whose failings afford
To the wife of his heart, such good cause for commotion,
That she seeks no excitement, save plaguing her lord.

Above all, you'll be careful that nothing offends, too,
Your wife's lady's maid, though she give herself airs.
With the friend of a friend it is well to be friends too,
And especially so, when that friend lives up stairs.

Under no provocation you'll ever avow yourself
A little put out, when you're kept at the door,
And you never, I scarcely need say, will allow yourself
To call your wife's mother a vulgar old bore.

However she dresses, you'll never suggest to her
That her taste, as to colors, could scarcely be worse,
Of the rooms in your house, you will give up the best to her,
And you never will ask for the carriage, of course.

If, at times with a doubt on the soul and her future,
Revelation and reason, existence should trouble you,
You'll be always on guard to keep carefully mute your
Ideas on the subject, and read Dr. W.

Bring a shawl with you, home, when you come from the Club, sir,
Or a ring, lest your wife, when you meet her, should pout;
And don't fly in a rage and behave like a cub, sir,
If you find that the fire, like yourself, has gone out.

In eleven good instances out of a dozen,
'T is the husband's a cur, when the wife is a cat.
She is meekness itself, my soft-eyed little cousin,
But a wife has her rights, and I'd have you know that.

Keep my counsel. Life's struggles are brief to be borne, friend.
In Heaven there 's no marriage nor giving in marriage.
When Death comes, think how truly your widow will mourn, friend,
And your worth not the best of your friends will disparage!





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