Emmeline and
Henry. Emmeline used to say that she did all her cryin' durin' her
honeymoon and Henry'd never caused her to shed a tear since.

"Nobody ever would 'a' known about her findin' the shirt and leavin'
her husband if she hadn't told it herself, for the old folks on both
sides felt so ashamed o' Henry and Emmeline for the way they'd acted
that they never would 'a' told it. But Emmeline told Milly Amos and
Milly told Sam, and the first thing you knew everybody in Goshen was
laughin' over Emmeline leavin' her husband, and everybody was
disputin' about which was in the right and which was in the wrong. I
ricollect Sam Amos sayin' that any woman that went rummagin' around in
a man's trunk deserved to find trouble, and his sympathies was all
with Henry; and Milly said Henry ought to 'a' told Emmeline whose
shirt it was and not kept her grievin' and worryin' all that time. And
Sam says, 'Yes, he ought to 'a' told her, but if he had 'a' told her
it wouldn't 'a' helped matters, for she wasn't in a frame o' mind to
believe him.' Says he, 'You women are always suspicionin' a man, and
if you come across a piece of circumstantial evidence you'll convict
him on that and hang him in spite of all he can say for himself.'

"I ricollect our Mite Society got to talkin' one day about husbands
and wives leavin' each other, and whether it was ever right or lawful
for married folks to part and marry again. Maria Petty says, says she,
'There's some things that every woman's called on to stand, and
there's some things that no woman ought to stand.' And Sally Ann
says, 'Yes, and as long as you women think you have to stand things,
you'll have things to stand.' And Milly Amos says, 'A husband and a
wife can part when there's no children, but,' says she, 'if they've
had children, you might put the husband on one side o' the world and
the wife on the other and they're husband and wife still, for there's
the children holdin' 'em together.' I ricollect everybody had a
different opinion, and the longer we talked the further we got from
any sort of agreement about it."

And as it was in Goshen so was it in Athens when Plato wrote and
taught, and so it is to-day wherever human wisdom offers its varying
solutions to this problem of the ages.

"What do you think about it, Aunt Jane?" I asked.

Aunt Jane was silent. Intuitively she felt the magnitude of the
question. We had laughed over the comedy of her story, but its rustic
scenery had shi