United States or Indonesia ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
William Piddock, in 1728, devised his farm at Winson-green, about nine acres, to his wife Sarah, during life, and at her death, to his nephews and executors William and John Riddall, their heirs and assigns for ever, in trust, for educating and putting out poor boys of Birmingham; or other discretional charities in the same parish.
That she kept a clean and respectable house; that her children were well fed, clothed and cared for, had not counted to her credit one jot among the powers that be. Her husband was not safe on the man's side of the Black Cat screen. At ten o'clock, did Riddall brave his chances to that hour, Marsena would march boldly into the arena and claim her quarry.
Jude grimly smiled as he recalled how the men and boys gave Marsena and her brood a jeering send-off as the rattling train bore them away soon after Riddall had been laid behind the disused church. So while Marsena was still in Jude's memory, he came upon the deserted and decaying cottage where once Lola Laval had sung her pretty French-Canadian song.
Jude remembered Marsena Riddall. What a woman she had been! What a menace to man's rights and woman's position. She had demanded, and got her husband's wages as he returned from camp. She met him at the edge of the North Wood, and held him up, morally and physically.
If a man rose to expostulate, Marsena was equal to him with tongue and wit. Masculine superiority trembled during Marsena's reign, which lasted five years; then Fate downed her. Riddall was called away from his jailer by the command that even Marsena could not defy, and she and her children faced life in a village where a man was an absolute necessity unless there was money to take his place.
Word Of The Day