MOST of us see some romances in life. In my capacity as Chief Manager of
a Life Assurance Office, I think I have within the last thirty years seen
more romances than the generality of men, however unpromising the
opportunity may, at first sight, seem.
As I have retired, and live at my ease, I possess the means that I used
to want, of considering what I have seen, at leisure. My experiences
have a more remarkable aspect, so reviewed, than they had when they were
in progress. I have come home from the Play now, and can recall the
scenes of the Drama upon which the curtain has fallen, free from the
glare, bewilderment, and bustle of the Theatre.
Let me recall one of these Romances of the real world.
There is nothing truer than physiognomy, taken in connection with manner.
The art of reading that book of which Eternal Wisdom obliges every human
creature to present his or her own page with the individual character
written on it, is a difficult one, perhaps, and is little studied. It
may require some natural aptitude, and it must require (for everything
does) some patience and some pains. That these are not usually given to
it,—that numbers of people accept a few stock commonplace expressions of
the face as the whole list of characteristics, and neither seek nor know
the refinements that are truest,—that You, for instance, give a great
deal of time and attention to the reading of music, Greek, Latin, French,
Italian, Hebrew, if you please, and do not qualify yourself to read the
face of the master or mistress looking over your shoulder teaching it to
you,—I assume to be five hundred times more probable than improbable.
Perhaps a little self-sufficiency may be at the bottom of this; facial
expression requires no study from you, you think; it comes by nature to
you to know enough about it, and you are not to be taken in.
I confess, for my part, that I _have_ been taken in, over and over again.
I have been taken in by acquaintances, and I have been taken in (of
course) by friends; far oftener by friends than by any other class of
persons. How came I to be so deceived? Had I quite misread their faces?
No. Believe me, my first impression of those people, founded on face and
manner alone, was invariably true. My mistake was in suffering them to
come nearer to me and explain themselves away.