Punch / Almanack (1846)

PUNCH'S ALMANACK FOE 1846.

CHAP. IV. - SHOWING HOW CAUDLE, HAVING LOST MONEY AT CARDS, DETERMINES TO ABRIDGE THE HOUSE-EXPENSES.

" I don't know how it is, my dear, but when I remember that there's only
you and myself—just two of us. and 1 eat and drink next to nothing—and
when I see what other people do with half our money. I do think you might
be a little more careful. I'm sure 1 spend no money on myself—none.
Nobody can be more watchful of every sixpence ; but, of course, a man can
save but little when he knows —or, that is, when he fears he knows that
everything's going to waste at home. Besides, it's a woman's place — parti-
cularly a woman's place—to save. Women were designed for it. Economy is
one of the noblest virtues bound up with matrimony. There can be very
little real love, Mrs. Caudle, where economy's neglected. A woman can't
truly care for a man's heart, unless she has an equal regard for his pocket:
the things go together, and always did from the first.

" No, Mrs. Caudle, IVlid not lose at my whist club last night—that is,
only next to nothing ; in other words, nothing to speak of. Now, that 'a
like your sex. You always set about hunting for some foolish, shabby
motive for whatever your husbands complain about. Because I lose at
cards, I don't want to get the money hack out of your cupboard. No: I
want to save money, that, should I be taken from you—and life at all times
is uncertain, Mrs. Caudle—you might be left snug and comfortable—that's
my object. But I never knew any woman yet—except, one, rest her sainted
soul!—who had the mind or the generosity to allow a truly noble motive to
wkat her husband should do ; that is, if it went against herself. You can't

help it—poor things !—nevertheless, when a man is depriving himself of
every little enjoyment that he may lay by something for a rainy day, it is
hard"—a little hard, I think—to have a woman spend what you do in house-
keeping.

" Now, Mrs. Caudle, be rational ; and, for the thousandth time, let me
beg of you not to cry. You only waste your trouble and your tears. Both
are thrown away upon me : I'm not one of the people, I tell you again, to
be melted with a little soft water. My expenses, that is, your expenses are
dreadful. Your grocer's bill—and when 1 never taste sugar in my tea—is
preposterous; enough to ruin a man of ten thousand a year. What ? I take
sugar in my grog, and so do my friends? Scarcely any—nothing to speak
of : not worth naming.

" And then look at your butcher for the last fortnight. Well? I know
I won't eat cold joints." I had enough of them with my first - that is, I can't
bear 'em. Besides, with half the money you have, a cold joint's an insult
to any man.

" And finally, Mrs. Caudle,—for you know I hate this talk at breakfast,
it's a meal, of "all others, I like to enjoy when I can,—finally, I have made
a calculation, and in the next month, come what will, your cupboard must
do with ten pounds less. It's for your good, I tell you, when I'm gone, and
ten pounds I must have of you."