How can you tell if a woman will make a good wife? According to William Cobbett's 1829 advice manual, take her out for a mutton chop and watch her jaw movements. Firm, decisive biting indicates good character. Tentative squeezing indicates disaster.

This episode explores one of the most entertainingly bizarre marriage advice books ever written by a man uniquely qualified to give it—not because he was a relationship expert, but because he'd been married to the same woman for 37 years through imprisonment, multiple exiles, financial ruin, and the time he dug up Thomas Paine's bones for a heroic burial that never happened. William Cobbett was a radical reformer who'd been sued for libel multiple times, imprisoned for two years, and fled countries on three separate occasions. But through it all, Anne Reed was there.

Discover Cobbett's physical tests for detecting wife material: walking speed reveals capacity for love (quick step with heavy tread = good, sauntering = cold-hearted mother), jaw movements predict industriousness (watch her eat cheese for the truth), voice quality indicates laziness ("mawmouth women" who let sounds fall out are disgusting), and general "sobriety of conduct" (steady, serious, no capering). These weren't just Georgian superstition—they reflected widespread belief in physiognomy, the idea that moral character could be read from physical features and behaviors.

But here's where it gets fascinating: Cobbett demands absolute wifely obedience (a henpecked husband should drown himself, apparently), yet his own behavior tells a completely different story. When Anne was 14, he sent her his entire life savings (150 guineas, roughly £22,000 today) and told her to spend it on comfort. Four years later, she handed it back untouched—she'd worked as a servant for £5/year and saved every penny. When they married, he spent entire nights walking barefoot through Philadelphia streets throwing stones at dogs so the barking wouldn't disturb her sleep. He helped with the baby, lit fires, boiled tea, and rushed home through thunderstorms because he knew she was frightened.

The contradiction is remarkable: a man who insists on male authority while demonstrating extraordinary devotion. Who demands wives obey but spends his life serving his wife's comfort and happiness.

Features readings from "Advice to Young Men and (Incidentally) to Young Women" by William Cobbett (1829), complete with his accounts of courtship, marriage, exile, and the devoted partnership that survived everything Georgian England could throw at them.