but
a supreme example of buying a pig in a poke, followed by an immediate
slump in his own special purchase.

I never can understand why women immediately become "ruffled" when a mere
man suggests that, if marriage be a serious business, the least a girl
can do is to learn the business side of that business before she enters
into partnership. But "ruffle" they do. Also they think that you have
insulted the sex, rather as if you had accosted a goddess with a
"tickler," or stood before the Sphynx and, regarding her mysterious
smile, said, "Give it up, old Bean!" For, after all, if the man has to
pay the piper, it's up to the woman to know how to make a tune! As it
is, so many husbands seem to make money for their wives to waste it. No
wonder there are so many bachelors about, and no wonder there is an
outcry to "tax them." Even then many men will pay the tax gladly, plus
an entertainment tax if necessary--who knows? For elder people are so
fond of drilling into the ears of youth the truism that passion dies and
that marriage, to be successful, must be founded upon something more
enduring than a feeling of delirium under the stars. That is why a
School for Wives would be so useful. After passion is dead, it would be
a poor creature of a husband who couldn't find comfort living in the same
house with a woman who had obtained her certificate for economical
housekeeping and sock-mending. You see, the home is the wife's part of
the business. The husband only comes in on sufferance, to pay the bills,
listen to complaints, and be a "man about the place," should a man be
required. A happy home, a comfortable home, that is a wife's creation.
But she can't create the proper atmosphere merely by being an expert on
Futurism in music, nor by possessing a back which it would be a crime of
fashion not to lay bare. She has got to know the business side of
housekeeping and home economics before an indifferent husband can be
turned into a good one. You ask, why not a School for Husbands? Well,
husbands have passed their "final" when they have earned enough money to
keep a wife. The husband provides the house and the wife makes the home.
But most wrecked homes are wrecked through ignorance, so why not let
wisdom be taught? A well-run home is three parts of a happy one. And if
the other part be missing--well, let's have a divorce. Easy divorce
certainly encourages domestic mess-ups, but they are not half such a
"mess" as