LEGAL CRUELTY. Such conduct on the part of a husband as will endanger the life, health, or limb of his wife, or create a rea sonable apprehension of bodily hurt; such acts as render cohabitation unsafe, or are likely to be attended with injury to the Person or to the health of the wife; Odom v. Odom, 36 Ga. 286; 2 Curt. Eccl. 281; Ma hone v. Mahone, 19 Cal. 626, 81 Am. Dec. 91; Hughes v. Hughes, 44 Ala. 698; Ward v. Ward, 103 Ill. 477; Beyer v. Beyer, 50 Wis. 254, 6 N. W. 807, 36 Am. Rep. 848; Kennedy v. Kennedy, 73 N. Y. 369; Smith v. Smith, 33 N. J. Eq. 458.
In McMahen v. McMahen, 186 Pa. 490, 40 Atl. 795, 41 L. R. A. 802, a definition was adopted from Bish. M. & D., taken from Ev ans v. Evans, 1 Hagg. Con. 35: "Cruelty is such conduct in one of the married par ties as renders further cohabitation danger ous to the physical safety of the other, or creates in the other such reasonable appre hension of bodily harm as materially to in terfere with the discharge of marital du ties." No single act of cruelty, however se vere, that comes short of endangering the life, is sufficient to justify a divorce; May v. May, 62 Pa. 206.
Cruelty usually means the infliction or threatened infliction of bodily harm, by per sonal violence, actual or threatened, or by words or conduct causing mental suffering, and thereby injuring or tending to injure the health. In a few states bodily injury is not necessary ; Tiffany, Dom. Rel.
Those acts which affect the life, the health, or even the comfort, of the party aggrieved, and give a reasonable apprehension of bodily hurt, are called cruelty. What merely wounds the feelings is seldom admitted to be cruelty, unless the act be accompanied with bodily injury, either actual or menaced. Mere austerity of temper, petulance of man ners, rudeness of language, a want of civil attention and accommodation, even occasion al outbreaks of passion, will not amount to legal cruelty ; Shaw v. Shaw, 17 Conn. 189; d fortiori, the denial of such indulgences and particular accommodations, as are ordinari ly considered necessaries, is not cruelty.
That which merely wounds the feelings without being accompanied by bodily injury or actual menace does not amount to legal cruelty.; Latham v. Latham, 30 Gratt. (Va.) 307; Pidge v. Pidge, 3 Mete. (Mass.) 257; Close v. Close, 24 N. J. Eq. 338; Faller v. Faller, 10 Neb. 144, 4 N. W. 1036; the inflic tion of mental suffering cannot constitute cruelty unless it endangers the life or health of the person injured; [1895] Prob. 315; Ashton v. Grucker, 48 La. Ann. 1194, 20 South. 738 ; Burney v. Burney, 11 Tex. Civ. App. 174, 32 S. W. 328; but it has been held that there may be such legal cruelty as to endanger the health of the wife without threats of bodily injury ; as where a hus band subjected his wife to a severe course of what he deemed to be affectionate moral discipline, and by so doing broke down her health and rendered a serious malady im minent ; L. R. 2 P. & M. 31; Lyster v. Lys ter, 111 Mass. 327; so compelling a wife to live at times in an attic without any con veniences whatever, leaving her for a period of six weeks without means to pay her board, and using insulting and abusive lan guage to her is legal cruelty ; Cary v. Cary, 106 Mich. 646, 64 N. W. 510 ; and falsely ac cusing her of unchastity ; Smith v. Smith, 8 Or. 100; Palmer v. Palmer, 45 Mich. 150, 7 N. W. 760, 40 Am. Rep. 461; Kennedy v. Kennedy, 60 How. Pr. (N. Y.) 151; Walter mire v. Waltermire, 110 N. Y. 183, 17 N. E. 739; Folmar v. Folmar, 69 Ala. 84; repeated ly and causelessly charging the husband be fore others with adultery ; Wagner v. Wag ner, 36 Minn. 239, 30 N. W. 766 ; (contra, McAlister v. McAlister, 71 Tex. 695, 10 S. W. 294 ; and where the husband has reason to suspect his wife of infidelity ; Kennedy v. Kennedy, 73 N. Y. 269). So when coupled with many other matrimonial shortcomings ; Massey v. Massey, 40 Ind. App, 407, 80 N. E. 977, 81 N. E. 732.