efore expresses displeasure by silence. The remedy for sulkiness is,
to suffer it to take its _full swing_; but it is better not to have the
disease in your house; and to be _married to it_ is little short of
madness.

126. _Querulousness_ is a great fault. No man, and, especially, no
_woman_, likes to hear eternal plaintiveness. That she complain, and
roundly complain, of your want of punctuality, of your coolness, of your
neglect, of your liking the company of others: these are all very well,
more especially as they are frequently but too just. But an everlasting
complaining, without rhyme or reason, is a bad sign. It shows want of
patience, and, indeed, want of sense. But, the contrary of this, a _cold
indifference_, is still worse. 'When will you come again? You can never
find time to come here. You like any company better than mine.' These,
when groundless, are very teasing, and demonstrate a disposition too
full of anxiousness; but, from a girl who always receives you with the
same _civil_ smile, lets you, at your own good pleasure, depart with the
same; and who, when you take her by the hand, holds her cold fingers as
straight as sticks, I say (or should if I were young), God, in his
mercy, preserve me!

127. _Pertinacity_ is a very bad thing in anybody, and especially in a
young woman; and it is sure to increase in force with the age of the
party. To have the last word is a poor triumph; but with some people it
is a species of disease of the mind. In a wife it must be extremely
troublesome; and, if you find an ounce of it in the maid, it will become
a pound in the wife. An eternal _disputer_ is a most disagreeable
companion; and where young women thrust their _say_ into conversations
carried on by older persons, give their opinions in a positive manner,
and court a contest of the tongue, those must be very bold men who will
encounter them as wives.

128. Still, of all the faults as to _temper_, your _melancholy_ ladies
have the worst, unless you have the same mental disease. Most wives are,
at times, _misery-makers_; but these carry it on as a regular trade.
They are always unhappy about _something_, either past, present, or to
come. Both arms full of children is a pretty efficient remedy in most
cases; but, if the ingredients be wanting, a little _want_, a little
_real trouble_, a little _genuine affliction_ must, if you would effect
a cure, be resorted to. But, this is very painful to a man of any
feeling;