1829.] puny 
THE WIFE OF SEVEN HUSBANDS: A LEGEND OF. LONDON. 
In the beginning of the reign of Edward the First, of long-legged 
memory, there lived upon Corne-hille, over against the spot where the 
water-tonne was a few years afterwards built, a certain blithe and 
buxome widow, very wealthy, and as fair withall as she was wealthy : 
she was only in her twenty-eighth year, of a tall and stately shape and 
bearing, and with commanding and yet right modest features: her face 
was oval, her hair and eyes of bright black; her forehead high; her 
eyebrows arched, almost into semi-circles ; her nose slightly aquiline ; 
her cheeks high coloured, and yet delicately so; her lips small, and 
prettily bent ; her teeth white and regular ; her chin rather forward and 
dimpled ; and her complexion dark though not swarthy: so that upon 
the whole she had rather a Jewish cast of countenance, and yet there 
was no rightful reason to suspect that there was even a drop of Israelitish 
blood in her vains, for her father, and his fathers before him, for many 
generations back, had been rich and respectable goldworkers, citizens of 
London, and had always married among their equals and friends. 
Busy tongues, however, there were that whispered something or other 
to this effect—that the maternal grandmother of Mrs. Alice (my young 
and pretty widow), during the absence of her husband, who was a mer- 
chant, had become pretty closely acquainted with a young Hebrew, at that 
time staying in London ; and that, when her husband returned, he was, 
for some reason or other, so angry with his wife, that he put her away 
from him, and would never after see her, though he provided for her 
during her life, and himself educated the children she had borne up to 
the period of their parting. Now, though the latter part of this story is 
undoubtedly true, I would nevertheless caution my readers, gentle and 
simple, not to put too much trust in the former part thereof; remember- 
ing that husbands are husbands, and, from the beginning of the world 
to the present day, have been, and are, a jealous and wayward race ; 
and, moreover, that the breath of slander will at times sully the brightest 
reputations ; and, besides, that conclusions are too frequently drawn 
which the premises will by no fair means justify. 
But be this as it may, Mistress Alice was a very handsome woman, and, 
as has been before said, very wealthy, for her father always petted her, 
and although he had two other children, sons, he quarrelled with them 
both and turned them out of doors, and very solemnly vowed he would 
disinherit them, and there is little doubt he would have kept his vow, 
but that they prevented him, the eldest, by being drowned in the Fleet 
river, and the other by getting murdered in an affray with the city watch. 
At the old man’s death, therefore, he left all his property, real and per- 
sonal, to his “ deare daughter Alice,” who was then twenty-one years 
old, and had lately been married for the first time in her life. She has 
been already introduced to the reader as a widow, and if he was tempted 
to be surprised at her being so young a one, what will he think when 
he reads that she was a widow for the fifth time ?—ay, and was now on 
the eve of being married to her sixth husband—this was a Master Simon 
Shard, a draper of Corne-hill, who had a well-filled purse, a rather 
corpulent figure, a round and ruddy face, and was about two and thirty 
years of age. It was said he had been enamoured of the fair Alice pre- 
viously to her three last marriages, but that he had not had courage 
enough to break his mind to her till some time after the death of her 
