William Winstanley

“ RANK SCOLD is a Devil of the feminine gender; a serpent, perpetually hissing, and spitting of venom; a composition of ill-nature and clamour. You may call her animated gunpowder, a walking Mount Etna that is always belching forth flames of sulphur, or a real purgatory, more to be dreaded in this world, than the Pope's imaginary hot-house in the next. A burr about the moon, is not half so certain a presage of a tempest at sea, as her brow is of a storm on land. ”

“ She interprets all she hears in the worse sense, and supplies the defect of real affronts with jealous suspicions. She is more captious, than capable of offence; and all her neighbours bless themselves from her, wishing this Quotidiano fever of her tongue cured with a razor. Yet is not that her only weapon; for she has hands to clap with, and nails to scratch with, and teeth to bite with, and much more furniture for war; so that being looked upon as invincible, her bad humour gets her a privilege: for wherever she comes, she may be sure to have the room to herself ”

“ She makes such a pattering with her lips when she walks the streets, as if she were possessed; and so indeed she is, with the spirit of contention. The dog-days, with her, continue all the year round; nor can she possibly take cold: for she is ever in a heat, and holds neither pox nor plague so grievous a disease, as being tongue-tied. ”