Psalm-singing commenced and ended the
day in his house, and graces before meat and graces before sleep,
prayers and ablutions, thanksgivings and fastings, had so much thinned
the animal necessities of his household, that a domestic war was the
consequence, and the sheriff and the sheriff's lady held separate sway,
having equally divided the dwelling between them, and ruling each their
respective sovereignties with a most jealous watchfulness. All rights,
not expressly delegated in the distribution of powers originally, were
insisted on even to blood; and the arbitration of the sword, or rather
the poker, once appealed to, most emphatically, by the sovereign of the
gentler sex, had cut off the euphonious utterance of one of the choicest
paraphrases of Sternhold and Hopkins in the middle; and by bruising the
scull of the reformed and reforming sheriff, had nearly rendered a new
election necessary to the repose and well-being of the county in which
they lived.
But the worthy convert recovered, to the sore discomfiture of his
spouse, and to the comfort and rejoicing of all true believers.
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