Had Virginia Woolf been granted access to that Cambridge library (see A Room of One’s Own) she might have found the following lines by A.E. Housman, brought to my own attention by Matt at an Oxford library. I like to imagine this poem as the lyrics to a rousing spiritual with a repeating double-time chorus of “beat my wife (oh, Lord).”

When Adam day by day
Woke up in paradise,
He always used to say
“Oh, this is very nice.”

But Eve from scenes of bliss
Transported him for life.
The more I think of this
The more I beat my wife.