desman, who dates his Letter from _Cheapside_, sends me
Thanks in the name of a Club, who, he tells me, meet as often as their
Wives will give them leave, and stay together till they are sent for
home. He informs me, that my Paper has administered great Consolation to
their whole Club, and desires me to give some further Account of
_Socrates_, and to acquaint them in whose Reign he lived, whether he was
a Citizen or a Courtier, whether he buried _Xantippe_, with many other
particulars: For that by his Sayings he appears to have been a very Wise
Man and a good Christian. Another, who writes himself _Benjamin Bamboo_,
tells me, that being coupled with a Shrew, he had endeavoured to tame
her by such lawful means as those which I mentioned in my last
_Tuesday's_ Paper, and that in his Wrath he had often gone further than
_Bracton_ allows in those cases; but that for the future he was resolved
to bear it like a Man of Temper and Learning, and consider her only as
one who lives in his House to teach him Philosophy. _Tom Dapperwit_
says, that he agrees with me in that whole Discourse, excepting only the
last Sentence, where I affirm the married State to be either an Heaven
or an Hell. _Tom_ has been at the charge of a Penny upon this occasion,
to tell me, that by his Experience it is neither one nor the other, but
rather that middle kind of State, commonly known by the Name of
_Purgatory_.

The Fair Sex have likewise obliged me with their Reflections upon the
same Discourse. A Lady, who calls herself _Euterpe_, and seems a Woman
of Letters, asks me whether I am for establishing the _Salick_ Law in
every Family, and why it is not fit that a Woman who has Discretion and
Learning should sit at the Helm, when the Husband is weak and
illiterate? Another, of a quite contrary Character, subscribes herself
_Xantippe_, and tells me, that she follows the Example of her Name-sake;
for being married to a Bookish Man, who has no Knowledge of the World,
she is forced to take their Affairs into her own Hands, and to spirit
him up now and then, that he may not grow musty, and unfit for
Conversation.

After this Abridgment of some Letters which are come to my hands upon
this Occasion, I shall publish one of them at large.

_Mr_. SPECTATOR,

You have given us a lively Picture of that kind of Husband who comes
under the Denomination of the Hen-peck'd; but I do not remember that
you have ever touched upon one that is of the quite di