UC-NRLF 
 

 LIBRARY 
 
 UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA. 
 
 Class /\ 
 

Matrimonial Primer 
 
First Lesson in Designing 
 
Matrimonial Primer 
 
 by V B. Ames with a Pictorial 
 Matrimonial Mathematics & 
 Decorations by Gordon Ross 
 
 Paul Elder and Company 
 Publishers, San Francisco 
 
Copyright, 1905 
 
 by PAUL ELDER AND COMPANY 
 
 San Francisco 
 
 $ 
 
 The Tomoy* Press 
 San Francisco 
 
TO 
 
 H. S. A. 
 
 THE WISEST WOMAN 
 I KNOW 
 
 
 167623 
 
UNIVERSITY 
 
 is for Announcement, 
 Our modern pagan 
 
 way 
 Of publishing the wedding 
 
 bans 
 Anent the happy day. 
 
 If you are looking for a wife who 
 will be as pliable and responsive as clay 
 in the potter's hands, you'll have to 
 dig her up from foreign soil. 
 
 A lover is an indulgence; a husband 
 a confirmed habit. Acquire only a 
 good one. 
 
 167623 
 
The woman who charmed you with 
 her bright, vivacious wit may not be 
 able to keep it up three hundred and 
 sixty-five days in every year. You were 
 a stimulant, but you've become a steady 
 
 diet. 
 
 
 
 How beautiful is love! How perfect 
 it seems with all its illusions, delusions 
 and dreams! 
 
Addition 
 Ex. : One added to one = I 
 
is the Bride, all else beside 
 Doth strangely take to 
 
 flight; 
 The strains begin from 
 
 Lohengrin, 
 And the world drops out 
 
 of sight. 
 Her soul seems lost, till the 
 
 gulf is crossed 
 That their two souls 
 
 divide ; 
 Old shoes and flowers and 
 
 rice in showers 
 To earth recall the 
 bride. 
 
 Don't marry a man thinking you can 
 smooth him down or rub him up to 
 your ideal. If he does not appear ideal 
 to your blind love, better leave him to 
 some one more blind. 
 
 You'll probably never be called upon 
 to lay down your life for your wife, so 
 
you might as a tender substitute look 
 pleasant, don your dress suit and ac- 
 company her to her club reception. 
 
 Don't be a valet to 
 
 your 
 
 husband. 
 
is the Ceremony, long or 
 
 short, 
 
 According to their lon- 
 gitude or creed; 
 The man is always bored, 
 By the maid it is adored, 
 And for both it fills a 
 long-felt need. 
 
 Probably you intend your wife to 
 have some money; it might be con- 
 ducive to intelligent expenditure if she 
 knew about the amount. 
 
 If you have a large and generous 
 impulse, and wish to give your wife a 
 present and are not sure what she 
 
would like, you had better give her 
 some personal attention until the a b c's 
 of her tastes and preferences are known 
 to you. 
 
 If by any rare chance your husband 
 is a good talker, you will shine best as 
 a listener; if he isn't, give him an op- 
 portunity occasionally to practice. 
 
 Don't wear callous places all over 
 your husband's tender heart by inces- 
 sant demands upon his attention and 
 sympathy. 
 
might stand for Devil, 
 Or Dakota or Divorce, 
 
 Or for Duty to each other 
 That insures the happier 
 course. 
 
 Absence may make the heart grow 
 fonder; presents have been known to 
 have the same effect. 
 
 Don't be satisfied with just keeping 
 the wife keep her love, by about the 
 same methods used in winning it. 
 
Jenny Wren once said to her mate, 
 "How loud and conspicuous Miss Lark 
 is!" Johnny Wren strained his ear to 
 catch her every twitter. 
 
 "How ridiculously fat Mrs. Robin 
 has grown!" Johnny took admiring 
 note of her curves. 
 
 "What a disgraceful flirt Miss Blue- 
 bird is ! ' Johnny returned her coy 
 salute. 
 
 "What a terrible reputation Mrs. 
 Blackbird is getting ! " Johnny immedi- 
 ately investigated for himself. 
 
Subtraction 
 Ex.: One taken from one leaves "X" 
 
is for Ever, as each fondly 
 
 thinks 
 His love can never grow 
 
 less; 
 
 And above in the blue 
 Is one star for the true 
 Who love but one love 
 and that bless. 
 
 It's unwise to assume that your own 
 gray spots will escape attention merely 
 by painting the other fellow with black 
 
 ones. 
 
 As long as man seeks his mate and 
 proposes the union, lack of felicity im- 
 peaches only his judgment. 
 
If you marry a sweet young maid of 
 half your years with the idea of edu- 
 cating her to a similarity of tastes and 
 companionableness for declining years, 
 ten to one Cupid will start a rival kin- 
 dergarten not far along your life's way. 
 
 Perfect frankness as to your financial 
 standing will remove the temptation 
 to secret expenditures for your own, 
 and extravagant ones for your wife's 
 pleasure. 
 
for Flowers and Fortune, 
 Fair days and Faithful 
 
 Friends; 
 Full measure of life and 
 
 love, and 
 Faith till the story ends. 
 
 You may hope to influence your 
 husband's politics, religion, business, but 
 don't tamper with his pronunciation. 
 
 If the soul of the woman did not 
 appeal to you, regardless of its covering 
 of clothes or flesh, you deserve disap- 
 pointment, and will doubtless get it. 
 
You can make a selfish, inconsiderate, 
 dissatisfied husband out of a perfectly 
 kind and amiable man by performing 
 menial services that any healthy, self- 
 respecting man should do for himself. 
 
 To desire your wife's happiness 
 amounts to mighty little, unless you 
 are willing it shall be accomplished in 
 her way. 
 
is the Groom ; to under- 
 stand 
 The laws that govern a 
 
 match, 
 
 You stand in a row all 
 the men that you 
 know, 
 And at leap-frog incite 
 
 each back. 
 Your eyes tightly 
 
 bind 
 
 Until you are blind 
 Grab a frog and call it 
 a catch. 
 
 A partnership of lives involves a shar- 
 ing of liabilities as well as profits. 
 
 Clinging vines and business imbeciles 
 are out of fashion as wives. A course 
 in commercial law or social economy 
 is a valuable matrimonial asset these 
 days. 
 
Two positive matrimonial opinions 
 are apt to have a negative effect on 
 harmony. 
 
 Before your marriage did it ever 
 occur to you that your dressmaker's 
 awful and ruinous blunders, or the 
 rapid and unwarranted dissolution of 
 the parlor rug, or the unsatisfactory 
 method of tradespeople, or the exact 
 location and condition of your corns, 
 were just the sort of topics for a man's 
 perpetual home entertainment? 
 
Multiplication 
 
begins a trinity 
 
 Of words that have one 
 
 soul 
 
 Heaven, Home, and Hap- 
 piness 
 All play a single role. 
 
 If you married your husband without 
 compulsion, be his companion without 
 reservation. 
 
 Even the promise to love, honor, and 
 obey does not make imperative instant 
 repetition of all your friends' little con- 
 fidences. 
 
A little love is a dangerous thing. 
 
 Use your best conversational powers 
 occasionally at your own dinner table. 
 
is a lonely pronoun, 
 
 Retired from active use, 
 
 While ive works overtime, 
 And the Union allows 
 the abuse. 
 
 Can your wife acquiesce in the follow- 
 ing sentiment "The married woman 
 is the only one who is always sure of 
 her beau"? 
 
 There are nagging women and pro- 
 fane men; it is hoped they will all 
 marry each other. 
 
Many a man has won a woman's love 
 and later lost her respect. To keep 
 the latter is always the finer and more 
 vital accomplishment. 
 
 Few women admit half their physical 
 suffering; be generous with your sym- 
 pathy. 
 
recalls the Jars and Jangles 
 Of the Joneses over the 
 
 way, 
 And the countless family 
 
 wrangles 
 
 Overheard most any day. 
 Do you shudder at the 
 
 prospect ? 
 Not a shudder; nor did 
 
 they. 
 Are not you love's true 
 
 elect ? 
 
 Ah, no, just the same 
 old clay ! 
 
 A woman who appears at the break- 
 fast table hideous in curl papers and 
 sloppy wrappers must think she has 
 married a blind man or a sand burr. 
 
 A woman can easily overdraw on 
 her husband's sympathy; it is one of 
 his short assets. 
 
If you can act as your husband's 
 cook, laundress, housekeeper, tailor, and 
 barber, and still have time to keep 
 abreast of his intellectual wants and 
 pursuits, well and good ; otherwise, sac- 
 rifice a few of the above to companion- 
 ableness. 
 
 Try and discriminate between cour- 
 tesy and caresses; the latter are as out 
 of place in public as kimonos and car- 
 pet slippers. 
 
Division 
 Ex.: 'Two divided by one = o 
 
is for Kisses, 
 It also stands for 
 
 Kitchen ; 
 
 Their relative importance 
 Needs no mathemati- 
 cian. 
 
 Try and appear conscious that the 
 domestic machinery is running smoothly 
 before the opposite condition arrives. 
 
 The ceremony that made you a wife 
 has no charm to keep your husband's 
 love; that is done by your own per- 
 sonal charm. 
 
Every self-respecting husband should 
 have a private code known only to 
 himself. On the way down town he 
 makes the following memoranda: r s , 
 7 k: p d q ; and Brown, in the next 
 seat, infers that Black is composing a 
 cablegram to a Berlin banker, when he 
 is only promising himself to pay the 
 dog tax, leave his wife's gloves at the 
 cleaner's, and be home promptly for 
 dinner. 
 
 How did you entertain this man 
 before your engagement? Try some- 
 thing similar after marriage. 
 
ove takes a hand of each, 
 And they wander afar 
 
 and away; 
 And never again 
 To that maid and man 
 Can life be as yesterday. 
 
 When you are married, be a good 
 comrade, if it breaks every canon of 
 your church and ancestry. 
 
 A man should be willing to use the 
 same sort of ability in his position as 
 head of the family that he does as head 
 of a firm. 
 
For a wife who whines, or a husband 
 who sneers, there is no sort of marital 
 salvation. 
 
 You and your wife and your check- 
 book should be a committee on finance 
 that meets monthly with closed doors. 
 
is for Money and Mothers- 
 in-law, 
 And Millions of other 
 
 Mistakes 
 That every fond relative 
 
 clearly foresaw, 
 And mentions each time 
 for your sakes. 
 
 Of course, your wife has flowers 
 every day if you smoke more than one 
 El Sidelo. 
 
 When your husband seems willing 
 that all the economy shall be at the 
 home end, insist upon laundering his 
 shirts yourself. 
 
If you are morally, aesthetically and 
 financially certain that your wife ought 
 to enjoy a new Persian rug for your 
 den more than a box for grand opera, 
 don't be too confident of the charms 
 of Persia. 
 
 Don't give your husband a back- 
 comb for a birthday present. 
 
w is the appointed time, 
 The time for song and 
 
 laughter; 
 For love and joy and 
 
 deepest bliss, 
 For selfless thought and 
 
 holiest kiss, 
 For kindly word and 
 
 gentle way, 
 Forbearance, faith and 
 
 courtesy, 
 The time to dream of 
 after. 
 
 Did you really have foremost in 
 mind and at heart the woman's happi- 
 ness when you married? 
 
 Tandems came in with some other 
 foreign ideas; a span is rather more 
 our American idea in matrimony as 
 well as horses. 
 
It is barely possible that you have a 
 wife who would prefer a daily letter 
 during your absence to some new bau- 
 ble on your return, 
 
 Never ask your wife why she doesn't 
 
 get a dress like Mrs. . Unless they 
 
 are twins, the effect of following your 
 suggestion will appall you and mor- 
 tify her. 
 
is for Optimism, 
 
 That leads you to be- 
 lieve 
 
 That two can make one; 
 May it ne'er take its 
 leave! 
 
 Be entertaining to your husband, or 
 some other woman will. 
 
 A woman may hold out and even 
 wax stronger in spite of your financial 
 failure or a deformity that overtakes 
 you, but just sicken and die in the face 
 of uncouth table manners. 
 
A wise woman sometimes leaves her 
 husband long enough to increase his 
 appreciation, but not long enough for 
 him to seek consolation. 
 
 Even matrimony does not preclude 
 individual brushes and towels, and, oc- 
 casionally, opinions. 
 
is the general Public, 
 And the Public gen- 
 erally knows 
 About everything it 
 
 shouldn't 
 
 Except where to keep 
 its nose. 
 
 Beat your wife in private, but don't 
 mortify her in public. 
 
 A quail once said to her mate: 
 "Bob, dear, do get home before sun- 
 down, and don't forget the wheat for 
 breakfast and the milkweed down for 
 the new nest, and match these blue- 
 
berries at the upper corner bush, and 
 some wool tags from the stony pasture 
 fence, and " and Bob White has gone 
 without kissing her. 
 
 Don't always be talking of your hus- 
 band's devotion. It makes less fortu- 
 nate women hate you and the rest 
 disbelieve you. 
 
 If you dislike her friends and she 
 does not like yours, move into a 
 boarding-house and then neither will 
 have any. 
 
Compound Proportion 
 
begins the Quarrel 
 
 That neither one began; 
 That was altogether his 
 
 fault 
 
 If she had been the 
 man. 
 
 If all admiration and interest shown 
 by other men toward your wife is dis- 
 tasteful to you, why not insist upon 
 her wearing a tin mask ? 
 
 Adjust your mood to that of your 
 mate, but don't ever expect him to 
 reciprocate. 
 
Possible shipwrecks make such inter- 
 esting reminiscences if you only survive 
 them. Do not rob your matrimonial 
 voyage of all incident by jumping over- 
 board in the first squall. 
 
introduces Relatives 
 
 You never knew before ; 
 And some bear a close 
 
 resemblance 
 To the ancient scrip- 
 tural poor. 
 
 If a man's people are distasteful to 
 you, better not make them relatives, 
 unless you contemplate the field of 
 foreign missions. 
 
 If the sunshine of perfect frankness 
 does not dispel the first misty misun- 
 derstanding, a London fog may gather. 
 
The guests at your table should be 
 chosen with a view of compensating 
 your husband for much pleasant inter- 
 course with men and women, otherwise 
 sacrificed by his marriage. 
 
stands for the Solemn 
 
 Silences 
 That often between you 
 
 lay, 
 When hand clasped hand 
 
 in the twilight, 
 And you felt what 
 
 neither could say. 
 
 In the formula for matrimonial hap- 
 piness, any satisfactory substitute for 
 self-forgetting, self-effacing, self-sacri- 
 ficing love has never been obtained. 
 
 Devotion of the genuine brand will 
 make wrinkle remedies and rouge a 
 drug on the market. 
 
Every new home is a chemical lab- 
 oratory that may run to explosives or 
 spiritual radium. 
 
 If you want everything as your 
 mother used to make it, you will, of 
 course, be willing to imitate her father 
 in the size of your vest, checks, etc. 
 
PAKTIES WITH. oniMin OR DOto ROD noi 
 
 APPLY 
 
 Simple Fractions 
 
 A problem which intending students of this work 
 must not ignore 
 
ruth is the roof-tree's 
 
 shade, 
 Truth is the brook that 
 
 flows, 
 
 Truth is the light heaven- 
 made, 
 Truth is the warmth 
 
 that glows; 
 Truth is the soul, the 
 
 spirit, the all 
 That breathes through 
 the home, unless 
 it fall. 
 
 If your assets are broad culture, and 
 his are business integrity and capital, 
 the ethical success of the partnership 
 lies with you. 
 
 Not two wives in a thousand but 
 what are absolutely true in thought and 
 deed, but, being women, masculine at- 
 
tentions are dearer than myrrh and 
 sweet incense. Give yours the best 
 domestic article, and fear no foreign 
 competition. 
 
 If you have managed to invest your 
 husband with the infallibility of the 
 Pope, don't force your opinion of him 
 too persistently upon the general pub- 
 lic; they may have met him before. 
 
is the Union 
 
 That typifies the whole 
 Universe of matter 
 
 And Unison of soul. 
 
 Do exactly the same qualities give 
 you exactly the same pleasure after you 
 have married them? Well, you were 
 old enough to have known it. 
 
 Wear whatever your husband gives 
 you, even if it is a candlestick for your 
 back hair. 
 
You shouldn't have married him 
 unless you were willing to live in a 
 dugout in Nebraska on salt mackerel 
 and corn bread for the sake of living 
 with him; and if such is the case, a 
 shortage in the millinery allowance 
 won't cause any domestic gloom. 
 
stands for all the Virtues 
 That each in the other 
 
 admired; 
 And another score or a 
 
 hundred more 
 Each found must be 
 acquired. 
 
 You may be a regular Napoleon of 
 finance and a modern Alexander in 
 manipulating men, but try introducing 
 a raw Swede girl to a coal range, the 
 ice-box, the basement laundry, the attic 
 bedroom and the electric bells and 
 speaking-tubes and then go into exile 
 at Elba or Elmira. 
 
Be sure that your husband carries 
 each day the impression that he left at 
 home that morning the most charming, 
 cheery, freshly gowned woman in the 
 city. 
 
 Unless you are especially favored with 
 money, strength and the devotion of 
 servants, some of the domestic tradi- 
 tions will have to be sacrificed, and it 
 behooves you to decide early which 
 shall have precedence your husband's 
 convenience, your own culture, or im- 
 maculate housekeeping. There are six 
 possible variations of the order, but 
 only one produces harmony. 
 
UNIVERSITY) 
 
 A Problem in Decimals 
 Ex.: .80*$+. 20-*=? 
 
oman and Wine and 
 
 Woe, 
 A Wife and Work and 
 
 Weal 
 
 They each give pleasure 
 In different measure, 
 As the false or true 
 appeal. 
 
 If you selected your wife because of 
 her style, don't growl when the styles 
 change. 
 
 Having deprived your wife of all 
 other legitimate male escort by mar- 
 rying her, you can hardly in honor do 
 less in that line than when the field 
 was open to others. 
 
If you have a quick temper, don't 
 begin your first housekeeping in a 
 flat take a house with a coal and 
 wood cellar and furnace. These fur- 
 nish a means of working ofFany amount 
 of indigestion, grouch and profanity. 
 
is the Ten you lost just 
 
 when 
 The coal in the bin 
 
 was low; 
 Or it may be the bill that 
 
 went to fill 
 Her soubrettity after 
 
 the show ; 
 Or possibly, now, it played 
 
 that cow 
 Called the favorite on 
 
 the track; 
 
 Or it may be was caught 
 where Horatio 
 fought, 
 
 At the bridge, against 
 the whole pack. 
 
 Elevate your husband's sports by 
 participating in them. 
 
 If you have married a man with 
 sporting tendencies, don't expect him 
 to cheerfully substitute a symphony 
 concert for some Lou Dillon event. 
 
Don't take all elasticity out of your 
 husband's purse by keeping your hand 
 
 in it. 
 
 No gentleman compels his wife to 
 live in a blue haze of tobacco smoke 
 or a conversational atmosphere laden 
 with the rococco doings of his fellows. 
 
is the Youth that lingers 
 Long where love doth 
 
 dwell ; 
 
 Though the hair be white 
 And eyes lose sight, 
 Youth sings in the 
 
 heart, "All's well." 
 
 The most interesting book you can 
 ever put in your wife's hands is a bank- 
 book in her own name. 
 
 When you can use railroad graders 
 in your laboratory, cowboys for bank 
 clerks, chimney-sweeps for bookkeepers, 
 blacksmiths for stenographers, then 
 
attack the domestic servant problem 
 that your wife possibly has not handled 
 with entire success. 
 
 The firm conviction held three hun- 
 dred and sixty-four days in the year 
 that you've said an extravagant number 
 of fond, foolish things to your wife is 
 more comfortable than the entertain- 
 ment of genuine remorse for five min- 
 utes. 
 
 Your judgment may be good about 
 selecting gowns, but if it is really good, 
 you won't use it. 
 
may stand for Zero ; 
 In spite of the axiom 
 
 taught 
 That in marriage two are 
 
 one, 
 The result is often 
 
 naught. 
 Compound your interests 
 
 daily, 
 Subtract all fear and 
 
 doubt, 
 Multiply your joys, add 
 
 more love; 
 
 The sum's worth figur- 
 ing out. 
 
LIFORNIA LIBRARY