Indeed the worthy housewife was of such a capricious nature,
that she not only attained a higher pitch of genius than Macbeth, in
respect of her ability to be wise, amazed, temperate and furious,
loyal and neutral in an instant, but would sometimes ring the changes
backwards and forwards on all possible moods and flights in one short
quarter of an hour; performing, as it were, a kind of triple bob major
on the peal of instruments in the female belfry, with a skilfulness and
rapidity of execution that astonished all who heard her.
It had been observed in this good lady (who did not want for personal
attractions, being plump and buxom to look at, though like her
fair daughter, somewhat short in stature) that this uncertainty of
disposition strengthened and increased with her temporal prosperity; and
divers wise men and matrons, on friendly terms with the locksmith and
his family, even went so far as to assert, that a tumble down some
half-dozen rounds in the world's ladder--such as the breaking of the
bank in which her husband kept his money, or some little fall of that
kind--would be the making of her, and could hardly fail to render her
one of the most agreeable companions in existence.
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