is Dorothe Stevens so great that one must not say ill of her that they
be plunged in the pond? Did she but have her deserts, would she be at
home and Ann Linkon on the stool? Marry! I trow not!"

"Prythee, good dame Woodley, be more chary of your tongue, lest you be
brought to judgment," interposed a more cautious sister.

Dame Woodley scowled and ground her teeth in silence for a short
interval, and then resumed:

"I speak only to you five who know the wife of John Stevens truly.
Despite all her airs and efforts to assume to herself a superiority, we
know full well she hath her faults."

"Verily, she hath," interposed a female who had her hood drawn low over
her face to protect it from the morning sun.

"And I have heard that she does lead poor John Stevens a miserable life.
What with her extravagance, her temper, and the way she does hate his
old mother whom he loves, his life must be a burden?" continued
dame Woodley,

"Little the pity for him, though," interposed the woman whose weak eyes
were half-hidden by her hood.

"Why say ye so, Sarah Drummond?"

"The more fool he to maintain such a creature."

"Marry! think you, Sarah, that a wife is like a shoe to be cast off at