Truth in Fiction Or, Morality in Masquerade. A Collection of Two hundred twenty five Select Fables of Aesop, and other Authors. Done into English Verse. By Edmund Arwaker |
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 | Truth in Fiction |  |
160
FABLE XLVIII. The Polygamist:
Or, Two Wives, two Woes.
A Man of Middle Age, nor Young, nor Old,
Whose luke-warm Blood was neither hot nor cold;
To sute his Constitution, and his Years,
Bore, Countercharg'd, Argent, and Sable Hairs.
At this Half-bent he cou'd not live alone,
But two Wives marry'd, tho' scarce fit for one:
His Linsey-woolsey Temper both did crave;
One Young and Gay, the other Old and Grave:
Between these two he did himself divide,
That warm'd his cold, this cool'd his warmer Side:
As if they had a Coat in Blazon been;
The Partys They, and He the Pale between.
But the two Ladies, of unequal Age,
Strove who shou'd most her Husband's Love engage;
And, while they diff'rent Humours sought to please,
They kept the bandy'd Fool at little Ease:
The Elder Wife pick'd his Black Hairs away,
The Younger pull'd as busily the Grey;
And that they with each other might be ev'n.
They left him not a Hair 'twixt him and Heav'n.
Which made the Neighbours say, His Skull, no doubt,
Within as empty was, as bare without.
Whose luke-warm Blood was neither hot nor cold;
To sute his Constitution, and his Years,
Bore, Countercharg'd, Argent, and Sable Hairs.
At this Half-bent he cou'd not live alone,
But two Wives marry'd, tho' scarce fit for one:
His Linsey-woolsey Temper both did crave;
One Young and Gay, the other Old and Grave:
Between these two he did himself divide,
That warm'd his cold, this cool'd his warmer Side:
As if they had a Coat in Blazon been;
The Partys They, and He the Pale between.
But the two Ladies, of unequal Age,
Strove who shou'd most her Husband's Love engage;
And, while they diff'rent Humours sought to please,
They kept the bandy'd Fool at little Ease:
The Elder Wife pick'd his Black Hairs away,
The Younger pull'd as busily the Grey;
And that they with each other might be ev'n.
They left him not a Hair 'twixt him and Heav'n.
Which made the Neighbours say, His Skull, no doubt,
Within as empty was, as bare without.
161
The MORAL.
‘Men grown in Years, shou'd wisely Wives decline,‘For they but vex each other when they join;
‘But shou'd unequal Matches most avoid,
‘By which their Peace and Freedom are destroy'd:
‘For where prevailing Humours disagree,
‘That jarring Discord drowns all Harmony.
‘Such hapless Husbands no Proportion hold;
‘Too young for old Wives, and for young too old.
‘He that, while Young, betroths an Elder Wife,
‘Turns Tenant, to a falling House, for Life:
‘And he that takes, when Old, a Younger Mate,
‘Erects a Pile too large for his Estate.
‘When the Match suits, the House nor Wants Repair,
‘Nor Furniture, but what his Stock can spare.
| Truth in Fiction | |