The custom we mention, seems to be of pretty ancient date; it is alluded to in that old Book formerly quoted, _The Tales of the Queen of Navarre_. A Man, an Upholsterer by trade, as it is said in one of these Tales (for Men will sometimes avail themselves of the practice in question when it may serve their turn) a Man was in love with his servant Maid; and as he did not know how to find an opportunity to escape the vigilance of his Wife, and be alone with her, he pretended, in a conversation he brought about on the subject, on the eve of _Innocent’s_ day, to find much fault with the Maid; complained that she was a lazy Wench, and so on; and added, that, in order to teach her better, he proposed, on the next morning, to give her the _Innocents_. The Wife greatly applauded his resolution: at break at day, he accordingly rose from his bed, took up a discipline of such a monstrous size, that his Wife’s heart aked to think what correction the Maid was about to undergo, and ran up stairs with a disposition of seemingly very great severity: however, I am happy to inform the Reader, that, after he had bounced the door open, and at first frighted the Maid very much, every thing was concluded in an amicable manner. If from Ladies of a middling station in life, and in the class of Upholsterers, we turn our eyes towards Ladies of rank, and Court Ladies, we shall meet with instances no less instructive and interesting. We may, in the first place, mention the case of the Poet Clopinel, which has been alluded to in a former Chapter. This Poet, who was also called _John of Mehun_ (a small Town on the river Loire) lived about the year 1300, under the reign of Philip the Fair, King of France, at whose Court he was well received. He wrote several Books, and among others translated into French the Letters of Abelard to Heloisa: but that of his works which gave him most reputation, was his conclusion of the celebrated _Roman de la Rose_; a Poem of much the same turn with Ovid’s _Art of Love_, which had been begun by William _de Lorris_, and met with prodigious success in those times, and was afterwards imitated by Chaucer. However, Clopinel gave great offence to the whole Sex, by four lines he had inserted in that Poem, the meaning of which is as follows:--“All of you are, will be, or were, either in deed, or intention, wh-res; and whoever would well search into your conduct, wh-res would find you all to be.” _Toutes êtes, serez, ou futes De fait ou de volonté, putes; Et qui bien vous chercheroit Toutes putes vous trouveroit._ The meaning of these verses, if we take from them the coarseness of the expressions, which did not perhaps sound so harsh in those times as they would in our days, did not at bottom differ from the well-known line of Pope, “--Every Woman is at heart a Rake.”