_Abi._ He thought that the richer purchase, though with the worse conscience; but we'll to comfort her, and then go hear our husband's lamentations. They say mine has compiled an ungodly volume of satires against women, and calls his book _The Snarl_. _Tha._ But he's in hope his book will save him. _Abi._ God defend that it should, or any that snarl in that fashion! 41 _Tha._ Well, wench, if I could be metamorphosed into thy shape, I should have my husband pliant to me in his life, and soon rid of him; for being weary with his continual motion, he'd die of a consumption. _Abi._ Make much of him, for all our wanton prize; Follow the proverb, "Merry be and wise." [_Exeunt._ [251] There was a game at cards called noddy. [252] It was popularly supposed that a virgin might save a man from the gallows by offering to marry him. In _Arden of Feversham_, when the serving-man Michael promises to murder his master, Alice Arden says--"But Michael see you do it cunningly:" to which he replies:-- "Why, say I should be took, I'll ne'er confess That you know anything; and _Susan, being a maid_, May beg me from the gallows of the shrief." Alice bids him "trust not to that;" but he is convinced that all will be right:-- "You cannot tell me; I have seen it, I." Many similar passages might be adduced to prove that this extraordinary belief prevailed. I suspect that we must go back to the ancients for an explanation. Plutarch in his life of Numa tells us that a vestal virgin, accidentally meeting a criminal on his way to execution, was entitled by law to give him life and liberty.--The curious Manx custom in regard to rape may be noticed in this connection. The injured woman was presented with a ring, a rope, and a knife. If the offender was a bachelor, the woman might marry him with the ring; if he was a married man, it was left to her discretion whether she should hang him with the rope or castrate him with the knife (an awkward dilemma--for the married man). [253] Old eds. "seeme."--The correction was made by the editor of 1820. SCENE IV. _Isabella's house at Pavia._ _Enter_ ISABELLA, ANNA, _and_ Servants.