A SWOOP AND A SCRATCH When Molly Stillwater heard that Margaret and her "wild man" had gone into the woods for their honeymoon she said: "Rita's got to tame him and train him for human society.

So she's taken him where there are no neighbors to hear him scream as--as--" Molly cast about in her stock of slang for a phrase that was vigorous enough--"as she 'puts the boots' to him." It was a shrewd guess; Margaret had decided that she could do more toward "civilizing" him in those few first weeks and in solitude than in years of teaching at odd times.

In China, at the marriage feast, the bride and the groom each struggle to be first to sit on the robe of the other; the idea is that the winner will thenceforth rule.

As the Chinese have been many ages at the business of living, the custom should not be dismissed too summarily as mere vain and heathenish superstition.

At any rate, Margaret had reasoned it out that she must get the advantage in the impending initial grapple and tussle of their individualities, or choose between slavery and divorce.