p. 58 | BEATING HIS WIFE

Seventh-day Adventist Missionary Society · Oakland, California · Feb 3, 1881

BEATING HIS WIFE.

THE story was all over town. Everybody was talking about it. It was too bad, they said. What was too bad? Why, the new minister had been beating his wife! Was it possible? Yes, there could be no doubt about it. Mrs. S., who lives next door, heard a shriek about ten o'clock last night—a woman's shriek—from a chamber in the parsonage. She looked across, and through the curtain she could see that a man and woman were running about the room in great excitement. He was flourishing a stick, and striking with it. The blows could be plainly heard. And as he struck, she screamed.

Mrs. S. could hardly sleep that night, she was so excited by what she had seen. She was up early next morning. She hurried through her breakfast, and then started out—to see the poor abused minister's wife, and comfort her? Not a bit of it. She went to Eld. A.'s, found the family at the table, and told the news. Then she footed it to Eld. B.'s and Dea. C.'s, and over half the town. The other half that she had no time to call on soon heard it from the first half, and before noon there was great excitement in Ballville.

The officers of the church discussed the matter with heavy hearts. Such disgraceful conduct could not be endured. Something must be done. But what? Call at once on the minister and his wife and inquire into the matter? Oh, no; that would not be dignified and official. Besides, there could be no doubt about it. Did not Mrs. S. see the beating with her own eyes? So they called a meeting of the session, and summoned the minister and his wife. He had to answer a charge of unministerial conduct, and she to testify in the case.

They came, greatly puzzled and surprised. The case was gravely stated by the senior elder, when the culprit and witness burst into a laugh. Checking themselves, when they saw how serious and sad the session looked, they explained.

The minister's wife, though an excellent woman who loved everybody, and especially her husband, did not love rats. But the house having been vacant for some time, the rats had taken possession. When they went to their chamber, a huge rodent ran under the bed. The wife screamed. The husband caught up a stick and missed the rat, the lady screamed again. How could she help it? It was an exciting scene, and must have looked very funny to their neighbors who were watching through the curtained window. They laughed heartily when it was all over, and the rat was dead; and they could not help laughing whenever they thought about it.

The session were in a fix. They were down on Mrs. S. for making fools of them. They asked her, "Why didn't you go over to the minister's and make sure about the matter before you reported it?" And she retorted, "Why didn't you go and inquire into it before you called a meeting?" And all the town that talked yesterday about how the minister abused his wife, is talking to-day about what an awful gossip Mrs. S. is, and how she fooled the elders of our church.

I am mortified and disgusted. Is there any way to cure these mischief-making gossips? Would it be right to hang them? It seems to me that that passage in the third chapter of James about the tongue ought to be printed in big letters on a card, and hung up in all our churches. Don't you think so?—The Occident.