84 THROUGH THE FIELDS WITH 



wife put chintz coverings on the bridal stools, while he 

 turned up his shirt-sleeves and went about his business 

 again, invigorated by the full draught of that rich wine 

 of life. Clough calls it 



A needful human discipline to wed. 

 Novels of course depict it final bliss 

 Say, has it ever really once been this ? 

 A sort of after-boyhood to enjoy appeared. 

 Wiser tradition says, the affection's claim 

 Will be supplied, the rest will be the same. 



It would be pleasant to believe that Linnaeus lived 

 happily for ever after, but that would be the end of the 

 book. Where the novel ends the tragedy begins so 

 most of his biographers declare to have been the case 

 with Linnaeus. 



' The lady brought him a considerable portion, and 

 by her thrifty disposition was likely to increase wealth 

 rather than happiness.' 



His wife is described as a domestic tyrant. But he 

 himself never says so, though he dwells at no length on 

 the subject; he speaks of her as just the wife needful for 

 him. If she was unamiable, perhaps there were ex- 

 tenuating circumstances ; men of genius are generally 

 ' gey ill to live wi ' ; even Sir Thomas the Good of the 

 Ingoldsby legend was a trial to slim Lady Jane ; and 

 we all know what Mrs. Carlyle had to put up with from 

 her philosopher. Linnaeus was careless with his money, 

 while his Elizabeth, brought up in a c near ' family, 

 could not endure a lavishness so foreign to her 

 traditions. Linnaeus, too, tried all manner of experi- 



