And, owing to the fact that the fair sex have from the earliest period been regarded as mischievous, we find them styled "the devil's tools" and "the devil's nets"-a host of other uncomplimentary epithets having been applied to them for which, it must be acknowledged, there is little or no warranty. Pope says, "Every woman is at heart a rake," and Lord Lytton in his " "Lady of Lyons" :-

"Thou art the author

Of such a book of follies in a man,

That it would need the tears of all the angels,
To blot the record out!"

"

with which may be compared the popular saying, "When a woman thinks by herself she thinks or evil,” and with the Italian saying, "It is vain to watch a really bad woman.' There can be no doubt, however, that in many of the allusions of this kind relating to women justice has not been done to them, and there is some reason in the proverb of the Italian sisterhood, "In men every mortal sin is venial; in women every venial sin is mortal."

Amongst some of the bad qualities condemned in women, and against which man is warned in our proverbial literature, may be mentioned intemperance, and loose morals. According to one folk-rhyme

"Women and wine, game, and deceit,

Make the wealth small, and the wants great

which is told in various ways. In an old manu

script of the fifteenth century five evils to be avoided are thus summed up :-

“A young man a ruler, reckless
An old man a lecher, loveless ;
A poor man a waster, good-less;
A rich man a thief, needless;
A woman a ribald, shameless :

These five shall never thrive blameless."

Another version evidently of this old proverbial maxim communicated to Current Notes for December, 1853, runs thus:

66

'A wife that is unchaste is like a filthy sow;

An old man a lecher nothing more to be hated ;
A woman unshamefast, a child unchastised,
Is worse than gall, where poison is undesired."

with which may be compared the adage, “Play, women, and wine undo men laughing; or, as another version has it, "Women, money, and wine, have their good and their pine." But the illustrations already given show that some of the most severe strictures passed on women are those which relate to unchastity, one or two further instances of which we subjoin :

“An unchaste wife, working mischief still,
Is oft compared to a foul dunghill."

And

"A woman that spins in vice
Has her smock full of lice."

Again, we are told that "A fair woman without virtue is like palled wine;" an Arabian version being, "An immodest woman is food without bait; or, as it is thus said in some country villages, "A fair woman with foul conditions is like a sumptuous sepulchre, full of corruption ;" and further, "She that loseth her modesty and honesty hath nothing else worth losing; reminding us of the warning often given to those about to get married, "A fair face may be a foul bargain," inasmuch as

"There cannot be a greater clog to man,

Than to be weary of a wanton woman."

The Scotch say, "Ye may drive the deil into a wife, but ye'll ne'er ding him oot o' her,' implying that when a woman is once bad there is no chance of reclaiming her; and hence we cannot be surprised at the German proverb, "A bag of fleas is easier to keep guard over than

a woman.'

But, whether we regard women as good or bad, it is generally agreed they surpass man in either case, for, as the French say, "Women, ever in extremes, are always either better or worse than men," with which may be compared the following lines in Lord Tennyson's " Idylls," "Merlin and Vivien "

"For men at most differ as Heaven and Earth,

But women, worst and best, as Heaven and Hell.”

Occasionally old local rhymes allude in somewhat uncomplimentary language to the bad qualities of the fair sex. The island of Iona is separated from Mull by a strait about a mile long. An islet close to the Mull shore opposite the ruins of Iona is designated "The Woman's Island," owing to a tradition of Columba that he would not allow a woman or a cow to remain on his own island. The reason assigned for this ungracious command is embodied in an old folk-rhyme:

"Where there is a cow,

There will be a woman;
And where there is a woman,
There will be mischief "_

a saying which, we are told, is in certain parts of Scotland repeated as a good-humoured satire

on women.

It has long been admitted, even by those who disparage women's virtues, that her memory is excellent when she is anxious to keep anything in mind, and hence it is said that "if a woman has any malicious mischief to do her memory is immortal." Proverbial wisdom, again, tells how worthless and unprincipled women often amuse themselves by dissimulation, even going so far as to feign love: an apt illustration of such sham love from Hindustani proverb runs thus, "I'll love him and I'll caress him and I'll put fire under him; if it burn him what can I do?" I and there is a well-known Arabic adage which warns us that, "Women's immorality and monks' wiles are to be dreaded."

I See Fallon's "Hindustani Proverbs."

A

CCORDING to Lord Byron, "Man's love is of man's life a thing apart; 'tis woman's whole existence; " and under a thousand images the poets of all ages have depicted her as a mysterious mixture of joy and sadness, of agony and delight. But the truth of the well-known apothegm cannot be denied, ""Tis love, 'tis love that makes the world go round," for :

"Love rules the court, the camp, the grove,
And men below and saints above;

For love is heaven, and heaven is love."

It is only natural that much should have been written on woman's love-that inexhaustible theme which will continue to hold its sway till the end of time; for, as it was long ago said, "A woman will