[Illustration: MRS. FRANK LESLIE]
A
Social
Mirage.
BY
MRS. FRANK LESLIE.
PUBLISHED BY
F. TENNYSON NEELY,
LONDON. NEW YORK. CHICAGO.
MDCCCXCIX.
Copyright, 1899,
by
F. TENNYSON NEELY,
in
United States
and
Great Britain.
All Rights Reserved.
Contents.
CHAPTER. PAGE.
I. The Torments of Love 5
II. Friendship between Man and Woman 19
III. Love or Money? 33
IV. American Husbands 47
V. As to Good Manners 62
VI. About Marriage 76
VII. The Consequences 88
VIII. The Rights of American Girls 102
IX. A Plea for Artificialities 117
X. Vices and Foibles 128
XI. Woman’s Intuitions 143
XII. Sympathy as an Art 158
XIII. Women of the World 171
XIV. Woman’s Youth 184
XV. Old Maids 191
XVI. The Society Girl as a Wife 195
XVII. The Deceits of Love 208
XVIII. Woman’s Courage 222
XIX. The Difference between Sympathy and Pity 235
XX. Foolish Proverbs 249
XXI. How to Write a Letter 263
XXII. On Being Exacting 276
XXIII. Two Ends of a Stick 288
XXIV. The Helplessness of Women 302
XXV. And So They Marry 315
XXVI. Woman in Her Mood 327
XXVII. The Social Slang of Paris 338
XXVIII. The Agreeable Man 350
XXIX. Table Manners 361
XXX. A Conundrum Without an Answer 375
XXXI. About Engagements 389
XXXII. Wedlock in Danger 401
I.
THE TORMENTS OF LOVE.
“They are very much attached to each other, are they not?” asked I of a
friend, as we drove past a newly married couple strolling leisurely up
the avenue the other day.
“Well, I don’t know,” replied he reflectively. “I think I should say
semi-attached. See there!”
I looked just in time to see the husband run up the steps of his club,
while the wife, with rather a forlorn smile, signaled a passing omnibus.
“Semi-attached sounds too much like semi-detached,” replied I
pensively; and my friend, who is charmingly cynical, finished the
thought with:
“Sure to become so, and a good job when it results in unattached. Saves
a world of worry and bother.”
Now, was my friend right or wrong? I do not know that I could decide,
or rather I have decided so many times, first on one side of the
question, and then upon the other, that I will not reveal my present
conviction if I can help it, but simply put the question before you,
to be decided by each man or woman according to his or her individual
experience, observation or inner light.
Is it better to be thoroughly attached to some person of the opposite
sex, or to be thoroughly unattached, or having been attached to become
semi-attached, and finally altogether detached, which is, of course, a
very different thing from being unattached?
Evidently Tennyson considered detachment better than unattachment, for
he sang:
“’Tis better to have loved and lost
Than never to have loved at all.”
But as he was not laureate of America I don’t know that we are bound by
his ipse dixit, and I for one question it.
To be attached--that is to be thoroughly and avowedly in love with
some one, who is also in love with you and bound to you by some outward
and visible tie, so that other people leave you quietly in possession
of your own property, is certainly a most blissful and soothing
condition.
I will even go so far as to admit that this condition in its perfection
is the most satisfactory condition of which mortality is capable.
But then! You have no doubt occasionally blown soap bubbles and watched
them float away in the sunshine. Was ever anything more glorious, more
perfect in form, in color, in airy grace of motion, than a soap bubble
floating in the sunshine of a summer day?
But should you like to invest your entire fortune in pipes and soap
and water? Should you like to give up your friends and your home, and
arrange all the details of your life solely with reference to the
manufacture of soap bubbles?
Of course not. But why? Is not the first reason, and the prominent
reason, their evanescence? Is not their delicate brilliancy a very
byword for glittering insecurity? Do we not talk of bubble schemes and
bubble hopes and bubble promises?
Well, the condition I have specified, the condition we will call
the attached, the full fruition of successful love, is even more
glittering, more glorious, more ethereal, in its charm, and more
evanescent in its duration than the soap bubble. You have only time
to say, “Ah, this is the perfection of happiness!” before some flaw,
some cloud, some discord comes to mar that perfection which alone is
happiness.
The moment you lose absolute perfection you lose content, and there is
no happiness without content. To be attached, then, is to have now and
again the conviction that you are perfectly happy, and a good many more
thousands of times the conviction that you are wretched. Somebody said,
“Fear has torment;” but he made a great mistake. Fear has excitement
and interest, and the necessity for action, which is always a blessing;
but love, if you please, has torment, and plenty of it.
The woman who loves has, as it were, given a general invitation to all
the aches and pains, and smarts and worries, and doubts and suspicions,
and jealousies and heart-burnings of which the human soul is capable,
and they are like poor relations--they accept the slightest invitation
to come, and are impervious to all hints to go. If dislodged from one
room, they promptly take up their quarters in another. You may neglect
or slight them all you choose, may even forget their existence for a
time, but when you least expect or wish for them there they are, and
there they remain, or if by some rare good fortune they have to go,
“the scent of the roses will hang around them still.” You never can
forget how long they were inmates; you never can cease referring to
them.
The old story of “Scissors” has a deep foundation. The man and wife
quarreled bitterly as to whether something was cut with scissors or a
knife. The quarrel was made up, “they kissed again with tears,” and all
was well, when the wife remarked:
“But, darling, you are convinced now that it was scissors, aren’t you?”
“Why, I supposed you’d given in that it was a knife!” exclaimed he,
and at it they went again, until he pushed her into the well, and she
sank, with her hand thrust above her head, and the first two fingers
working like a pair of scissors. What I mean by quoting the story here
is that the suspicions and jealousies and resentments of love are never
forgotten, although they may be hidden, or even driven outside the
door, or drowned in the well. On the very next occasion they thrust
themselves above the surface, crying, “Scissors!” and the old battle is
to be fought over again.
If any man or woman were perfect, the case would be different; but
love, although a magician to make common things appear like glorious
things, is not a deity to make them actually so. The fairy gold is far
more radiant than earthly gold, but some day you perceive that it is
only leaves and twigs, not worth even the silver dollar of everyday
commerce for which you bitterly wish you could exchange it. So no
sooner does the trusting and loving neophyte become absolutely sure
that here at last she has discovered the one perfect man upon God’s
earth than the bubble bursts, a little tinkling explosion like a
fairy’s laugh, a little spatter of cold water in a startled face, and
the poor woman discovers that this man is very like other men, that he
is capable of being cross, that he is more or less selfish, that he
does not care to spend every hour of his day in her society, that he
has other interests, other friends, other correspondents whom he does
not choose to abandon; that he cannot say he never in his life looked
at any other woman with satisfaction, or if he does say so is probably
lying; that he is somewhat dull of apprehension, or is foolishly
sentimental, or is an inveterate smoker, or likes cards, or takes a
glass too much at times, or has some other or half dozen other of the
imperfections flesh--that is to say, masculine flesh--is heir to. Then
comes the time when she gives that general invitation to Errinnyes, of
which I spoke just now--then comes the time when she learns the lesson
that love has torment, and never again forgets it.
Nor must we be so unjust as to forget that the pronouns in the above
statement may be reversed, and instead of she you may read he, and
readily imagine the discoveries he may make to prove that the goddess
of his love, the “one fair, impossible she,” whom he, incredulous of
such wonderful fortune, has made his own, turns out just a woman, no
better, no worse, than the average, and no greater prize than several
hundred others of her contemporaries.
Then, if the man and woman are married--that is to say, if they are
attached in the sense in which a yoke of oxen are attached to each
other--the process of semi-detachment begins, and according to the
nature and the circumstances of the yoke-mates, becomes an internecine,
intermural warfare, with alternations of such happiness as is possible
where content has fled.
If this state of things goes from bad to worse, as it sometimes does,
it becomes the life of two galley slaves, manacled together, and hating
each other with a hatred impossible to those who are at liberty.
When things have arrived at this point, just one hope of salvation
from utter shipwreck remains--those who once were attached and then
semi-attached and then semi-detached, must call upon the law to break
the chain it has riveted upon their only too willing wrists, and to
pronounce them detached absolutely and without peradventure, each to
carry a scarred and wounded member through life, never again to be as
they were before they submitted to the bonds they now have broken, and
yet both of them thankful to have escaped even “by the skin of their
teeth.”
To be perfectly attached, then, is to be perfectly happy, but with a
happiness transitory and mocking as the beauty of a soap bubble. To be
semi-attached is to be tossed and torn with perplexities and annoyances
innumerable. To be semi-detached is to live a life of wrangling,
recrimination, suspicion, jealousy and heartburn--in its ultimate
stage, a life of such misery and hatred that death or the law’s harsh
cleaver must be summoned to break the semi-chain. To be detached is to
drag around the scars of the chain, to live a life of bitter memories,
and yet more bitter regrets, to be forever murmuring, “It might have
been! It might have been!” And so finally we come to the only position
left possible for poor, foolish, credulous, loving humanity--the
condition of the unattached.
To be unattached is, as I said before, entirely different from being
disattached, which is the same thing as being detached. But the
unattached is one upon whom the glamor and the thralldom of love have
never passed. The unattached person is one who has never blown a soap
bubble, and, what is more, does not want to blow one--a person so cold
by nature or so sensible by conviction that he sees through the soap
bubble business, so to speak, and declines taking any stock in it.
“Yes, pretty enough!” he growls, looking out of the corners of his eyes
at the floating, glittering glory, dancing on the summer breeze. “But
look there!”
And he points to the empty spot where it has been, and walks away into
the shade and the loneliness of his own little nook.
Or, if it is not he, but she, perhaps she remains unattached in quite
another fashion. She sees the bubbles, that they are fair and desirable
for a moment’s amusement, and she is shrewd enough to see that they are
frail as fair, and fit only for the moment’s amusement.
She by no means declines to share in the sport, but in fact eagerly
tries to excel it. She blows the biggest bubble of all, and she tosses
it most gayly into the sunshine, and she watches it with all her eyes
so long as it lasts, and when it bursts she is neither disappointed nor
grieved, but blithely turns and blows another as big, as bright, as
airy and as transitory. She neither deceives herself nor does she wish
to deceive any one else. If some playmate will amuse himself with her
at the pretty sport, she welcomes him, and takes it for granted that he
understands the nature of soap bubbles as well as she does. If not, it
is his own fault--he should have learned the rules of the game.
Do you ask if I mean that it is a good thing to be a coquette and play
at love, with no serious meaning in the play?
No; no, indeed. But a coquette is widely different from my ideal
unattached woman. The coquette finds her amusement in pretending that
the soap bubbles she wafts before the eyes of her victims are solid
and true and permanent--round globes, whose surface is all mapped off
in realms of paradise, and fortunate isles and mountains of perpetual
youth and gardens of golden apples.
She knows better herself, of course, but she is a sorceress, and has
the power of making those who come under her spell believe what she
will have them, and the more fully they believe the more amusement
she finds in the sport. After a while the bubble bursts and the spell
is lifted. Then comes the bitter end for the victim, and for the
victimizer the very cream of the joke--that is, if she is a real and
absolutely heartless coquette, but if she is not there is perhaps a
little remorse, a little virtuous resolution and a little quietude.
Then more soap bubbles, and the same thing all over again.
But the peaceful and happy “unattached” is one who is so wise, so
well-balanced, so self-sufficing, that love has never gained the
mastery of his will or his reason--one who is able to care for his
friends, and even to dabble and dally with the affections, and yet
never give way to them--one who is love’s master and not love’s slave.
Such men there are, and when once in awhile I meet one I look upon
him with awe and admiration. I walk around and around him as one does
around that tilting stone in Ireland, which may be gently rocked this
way and that by the hand of a child, yet resists the strongest man’s
efforts to move it from its base. For my part, I would not for worlds
move it, even if I could, nor would I move the man who resembles it.
The absolutely unattached woman who does not coquette, and who does
not even play at love and never has, is rare, but I have now and again
seen her also. She is generally literary or artistic or philanthropic,
for a woman must devote herself to something. She is generally plain
of visage and of dress. She is a little self-assertive and a little
opinionated, for she has never learned love’s sweet humility. She is
rather careless of the opinions of others, and thoroughly contented
with her own theories of life. She is, as a rule, very sure that love
is a folly, or at least, would be for her, and, what is more, it is a
thing she does not care to study or consider. She is perhaps the most
satisfied and contented of women, but is she the happiest?
That is the question to which I have never yet found a satisfactory
reply.
What do you think?
II.
FRIENDSHIP BETWEEN MAN AND WOMAN.
Not long ago a few congenial souls were discussing woman’s friendship
for man, when one party, a man, rather sneeringly and mockingly
exclaimed:
“What utter rot and nonsense this is to talk about platonic friendship
when we all know there is no such thing!”
Thereupon I made some defensive, and, I dare say, rather pointed
remarks, so that the rest of the company good-naturedly passed on to
another topic of conversation, as all people do when they imagine a war
of words is impending, and endeavor to avoid it.
Not so with my opponent, for later in the evening I saw him approaching
my corner and was prepared for something of the cross-questioning
which followed.
“I should have supposed that you were too intelligent a woman to have
clung to the exploded idea of platonic friendship,” he began rather
irritably.
“And my intelligence, if I have any, has solved and proved the problem
that it can and does exist,” I answered with provoking decision.
“Now you are really talking of something you know nothing about. I
will admit, if you like, that platonism in the old accepted form is
a bygone theory. It might have existed ages ago--in fact, I have not
the slightest doubt but that the dear old philosopher reveled in his
particular views and derived half the pleasure of existence out of his
hundred and one friendships for the opposite sex, but history tells us
he was a dear, exemplary, eminently respectable fellow, to whom the
ordinary human weaknesses of life meant very little. We are living in
a totally different atmosphere at present, and one must acknowledge
there are few, very few modern Platos. Yes, this is too material an
era for the recognized version of platonic love to exist but I still
stoutly maintain that an ideal friendship between the opposite sexes is
not only possible, but is an established vital fact, and there is no
lovelier thing on earth than such a friendship.
“A prominent divine recently acknowledged from his pulpit that in his
career his best friends had been women, and in the seventeen years of
his ministry the truest, best words of encouragement had come from his
female friends. We need only take a mental glance at those idyllic
friendships which have become historical.”
“Oh, of course, you are now going to quote the same couples every one
does when they discuss this subject,” said my friend, with a resigned
air.
“Well, I most assuredly intend referring to what are known as existing
facts,” I rejoined tartly. “The friendship of Mrs. Taylor for John
Stuart Mill through twenty years of literary communion, and the ideal
companionship of Lydia Maria Child and Ellis Gray Loring, ought to be
sufficient proofs that such a friendship as I contend exists can also
be genuine and of inestimable value.
“A woman’s faith in a man’s ability, a woman’s interest, friendship and
fidelity to the man whose avowed friend she is, will spur him on to
achieve fame, fortune, and all those good things of life.”
“Then she is in love with him, that is all there is about it,” said
my companion, still unconvinced. “The feeling and interest you
have described come from love, not friendship. Many people mistake
friendship for love. They love each other without knowing it, or they
love knowingly and maintain silence.”
“Well, what do you call that but the height of a noble, disinterested
friendship?” I rejoined triumphantly. “A person who, though possessing
a deep, intense affection for some man or woman, can yet efface that
love or hide it because the knowledge of its existence might give that
other pain, has reached the sublimity of self-abnegating friendship. I
knew just such a case. A man whose literary achievements were of the
highest order possessed the friendship of a woman who was herself a
successful litterateur. The man’s wife was a sickly, uninteresting,
irritable creature, toward whom he might have justly been excused for
being indifferent, and yet so strong were his ideas of duty and honor
that for years the love for his friend remained unspoken. Each knew the
other loved, but the loyalty of their friendship was paramount.”
“We French understand that much better than you Americans,” here chimed
in a distinguished French artist, who had been an attentive listener to
our little discussion.
“The friendship of Le Fèvre and Mme. Dacier is often cited, but they
were a pair of pedants, and I am sure were squabbling eternally,
and throwing Horace or Homer at each other’s heads literally or
metaphorically every moment of their lives.
“Voltaire and Mme. du Châtelet did much better. They contented
themselves during their long friendship with mangling poor Newton
between them, and, satisfied with this amusement, never thought of
marrying at all.
“You remember, too, that old story, don’t you, of Ponte de Vesle and
Mme. du Deffand, whose constancy to each other the whole eighteenth
century admired and exalted? They passed fifty years together in the
most delightful and perfect intimacy, to the great scandal of the women
of the day, who could not appreciate an attachment so deeply rooted.
There was never a cloud between them and seemingly no cessation of
their love. The honest man, Du Deffand, let it pass with a touching
resignation. But finally after all these years of attentions,
protestations, pledges and devotion, the two found themselves alone
in her apartments of Mme. du Deffand, with the husband long dead and
madame ill unto death. ‘What are you doing?’ she called out to her
friend from an inner room. ‘And where are you?’ ‘I am sitting in the
corner of your chimney, quite at home,’ he made answer. ‘There are very
few friendships as old as ours. It is fifty years and not a rupture,’
she sighed. ‘Yes, that is what I have always admired,’ answered he.
‘But,’ exclaimed she, ‘has that not been from the fact that at the core
we were very indifferent to each other?’”
“And the application?” I ask, a trifle anxiously.
“Lies in the fact that the foundation stone of your platonic
friendships is, after all, respectful indifference,” answered the
foreigner, picking up my fan and waving it idly once or twice.
“Then you think--”
“That there can be no affection between a man and woman without the
danger of its developing into a passionate attachment, and if they do
remain the sort of friends your charming American imagination would
have them, they must indeed care very little about each other.”
I immediately began an indignant protest, and continued my vigorous
defense of the subject in hand.
“What rank heresy to talk in that way! I know so many men and women
who are devoted to each other’s interests without any thought of love
between them, and I also know that those friendships have lasted
through trials bitterer than death. There must have been deep affection
at the bottom to have stood up under such attacks on its genuineness. I
have in mind also the case of a distinguished man of letters who, for
sixteen years, has been the devoted friend and counselor of a literary
woman, with whom he has maintained an unbroken correspondence. They
have shared each other’s hopes, fears and triumphs. During this period
many women have caught the passing fancy of the man, for, as it has
been aptly said, ‘A poet without a love is like a sky without a star,’
and he has wandered out of his friend’s orbit only to return, however,
with the tale of his disillusionment and to vow that friendship was
more satisfying and enduring than love. That word love has never been
spoken between these friends of mine for good and urgent reasons. The
man’s expression of devotion is in his books or articles, not always
in open dedication, but in the use of some pet name of his friend’s,
some passages of her life, some description of her personality or her
individuality, and thus he pays her a subtle compliment, which the
world sees not, but which associates her with his best work, and makes
her feel that she is its inspiration.
“In all this argument, however, remember I am speaking of people
educated to the highest degree of intellectuality, men and women
who thoroughly understand themselves and the world. With creatures
of a lower order of mentality, those in whom the materiality
predominates over the spirituality, these ideal friendships are among
the impossibilities. In the first place, they could not understand
the plane of thought from which such intellectual communication and
friendship draw their inspiration. With them the emotional part of
their nature would dominate every other sentiment, and when one
yields to materialism, of course, friendship ceases. Oh, no; the man
must be well poised and full of respect for the woman, and capable of
sacrificing himself for her well being, a man to whom brains and mental
advancement mean more than anything else, and above all, a man who
believes in the equality of the sexes in everything, and recognizes
the fact that women are as fully and completely equipped mentally as
the members of his own sex. However, in forming these friendships, he
must select the woman who is oftentimes hardest to gain as a friend,
who, although perhaps needing just the kind of association it is in his
power to offer her, yet gives the world and him the impression that she
possesses sufficient courage and independence to fight life’s battle
alone.”
“And the woman?” questions my listeners.
“Ah, the woman! Now we have reached the vital core of the question; for
indeed everything rests with her. She can make or mar such an ideal
friendship; she can gain and hold in its highest term the true, honest,
unselfish affection and devotion of some man, or through weakness or
wantonness she can merge it into lawlessness and shame, or even into
hatred. To begin with, a woman must be sure of herself; she should
study her own capabilities, know her own weak points and guard against
them, and with it all possess enough innate dignity to be able to
ignore or to check, as the case may require, any impulsiveness in her
friend’s nature.”
“You are speaking of a very remarkable species of woman, and one very
rarely met with,” interrupted my first opponent cynically, while the
face of the Frenchman wore the exasperating smile of one who is vastly
amused.
“I assure you I know myriads of women who are clever enough and
thoroughly capable of being a partner in an ideal friendship,” I reply.
“You don’t know what capabilities many women have until you have tested
them. What do the majority of men know of the inner natures of the
women they meet casually at receptions, dinners and balls? There may be
a dozen of your own acquaintances who have mental resources you never
suspected, and, as you have not demanded anything higher from them
mentally than the mere persiflage of society, why should they unfold
flowers of the mind that the frost of your skepticism would simply
chill and wither? Ah, my friends, too many women have proved their
great natures under the call of emergency for us to doubt at this date
that they are capable of anything they determine upon.
“First, remember this warning, though--try your woman. Don’t select
one who is eternally suggesting platonic loves, and who wishes you to
confide all your troubles to her after an evening’s acquaintance. She
is the one who will break your newborn faith and bring you back to me
with the worn out maxim, ‘I told you so.’
“Secondly, a man’s treatment of his woman friend must be considered.
He should bear himself toward her with a courtly consideration at
all times that will leave no doubt with any healthy-minded observer
that he first respects and then admires her. He must give to her and
her opinions the same deference he pays to those of his male friends.
He must avoid, however, too much of an air of tenderness to pervade
his manner, excepting that tenderness which a man might show toward
a child. A comrade? Yes, the one sincere friend who understands his
weaknesses as well as his good characteristics, and who will judge and
advise him impartially and with justice.
“Lastly, you must be prepared to meet with all manner of ill-natured
remarks and criticisms if you should ever enter into a friendship
of this kind. But if the man and woman have sufficient strength and
will to bear up and despise prejudiced cynicism, they will surely be
strengthened and ennobled by the true enjoyment of such an association.
I know of one pitiful case of a certain delightful companionship of
two friends of mine that I had watched for years, and that had warmed
my heart in watching, but cynics like you two men, together with the
worldly, calloused gossips who infest society, finally destroyed the
exquisite plant. The man thought too much of his friend to expose
her longer to the slights and slanderous remarks which he felt were
injuring her, and she came to me in her desolation with the wail on her
lips, ‘Will the time never come when a man and a woman can honestly
like each other without the world crying out love or flirtation?’”
III.
LOVE OR MONEY?
There is no smoke without at least a little fire to kindle it, and
there is no popular belief without some foundation in fact. Popular
proverbs especially are almost always indices to popular conviction
founded on experience, and for that reason are generally worthy of
attention.
Sometimes, however, the convictions thus expressed are thoroughly
repugnant to those--what shall I say?--finer sentiments, perhaps, of
our nature which, starting with us on the journey of life, are apt to
fray out, grow ragged and dubious, and finally wear away altogether,
much as the fringes and ribbons and laces of a smart gown will
gradually disappear, if the garment is taken for everyday wear.
One of these proverbs, as we all know, is, “When poverty comes in the
door, loves flies out of the window,” and our question just now is to
discover how much fire goes to the manufacture of this smoke, how much
hard, angular fact underlies this glittering generality.
Of course, we none of us wish to believe it. Human nature, left to
itself, is very sentimental, and the advanced optimists are simply the
people who decline to be convinced of the deceitfulness of sentiment.
For myself, I like to be deceived by pretty sentiments. I like to be
optimistic, and to cherish my childish faith that there is a gold cup
at the end of the rainbow, and some day I shall find it; that the moon
is made of green cheese, and that a bit of this same cheese, with bread
and kisses added, is a wholesome and sufficient diet for man or woman,
and especially for both together.
I say I like to cherish these beliefs; but the ugly question still
arises, Are they beliefs?
Well, how is it with you yourself? Are you perfectly satisfied of
the truth of any one of these suggestions--or rather, to throw aside
hyperbole, are you perfectly satisfied that bread and cheese and
kisses, with the man of your choice, is better than assured comfort for
yourself and your family with the man whom you didn’t choose, but who
chose you?
Mind you, I am not saying that I think it is or it is not, for, in very
fact, I do not know and never have quite made up my mind. As I say, I
love to be cheated by sentiment, but the trouble is that there is a
shrewd little demon of common sense lurking somewhere in my composition
who is forever pulling my pretty sentimental beliefs to tatters and
showing the hollowness of their foundations. Sometimes, I am sure, I
am able to convince myself that he is mistaken. Sometimes I can boldly
silence him and shut him up in a closet. But in a general way I must
confess that he has the best of the argument, and it is the sentiment
that gets put in the closet. But putting in the closet is not death,
you know, and both common sense and sentiment soon creep out again,
and the never-ending conflict is renewed. Probably my experience is
also yours, and that of plenty of other persons, for I rather think it
belongs to human nature in general, and, thank heaven, “there is a good
deal of human nature in man--especially in the woman.”
* * * * *
Riches or love--which will you have, if you can’t have both? Of course,
to have both--that is, an unlimited amount of love and not too large an
amount of money--is the ideal condition; but who possesses it or hopes
for it?
Not too much money, I say, for the multi-millionaire is so hampered
and harassed and badgered and pursued and intrigued for money that he
has neither time nor heart left for love; for Eros is a very exacting
little deity, and will not give the fullness of his gifts to any but
those who give him their lives--that is to say, their lives _for the
time being_.
No, a man who is too rich cannot be a good lover, for not only are his
mind and time preoccupied, but before reaching maturity he has become
imbued with the conviction that every man he meets is trying to cheat
him, and every woman intends to marry him, either to herself or some of
her family. This condition of mind is fatal to the mingled humility and
courage essential to the true lover’s character. A hare would not make
a good guardian for a confiding but timid traveler, and if, as is often
the case with hares, he was conceited as well as timid, it is so much
the worse.
The over rich woman is not likely to be a good lover either, because as
a general thing she does _not_ believe that every man she meets wants
to marry her simply for her money. The natural vanity of the sex works
to her destruction by suggesting that she herself is quite competent to
inspire all the devotion and admiration professed by her adorers, and
she nothing doubts that were she the beggar maid King Cophetua would
woo her just as ardently as he does to-day. Well, perhaps he would, but
my little demon of common sense suggests that more probably he would
not, and in this case I feel inclined to agree with him.
But the unlucky millionairess, accustomed from her cradle to the
servile adulation which surrounds such persons, has very likely never
made the acquaintance of cold, cruel Master Common Sense, and not only
does she believe that her own charms and merits evoke the attention she
receives, but she has become so accustomed to having her own way, and
fancying her own taste, and her own opinion, and her own prejudices
to the law of the world, that she is quite destitute of that grace of
adaptability which is the chief virtue of the woman lover.
* * * * *
Men are not adaptable--and we do not want that they should be, since
the principal attraction of their sex is its strength. Women, to be
sure, are just as strong in their own way, but it is quite a different
way--the difference between the oak and the birch. When the tornado
comes, the oak is snapped off at the root, but the birch prostrates
herself in the dust--submits utterly and abjectly--and when the
storm has passed, blithely resumes her upright attitude, shakes the
raindrops from her tresses preens herself a little, and is as good as
new.
Probably the oak admires the birch very much and calls her a sweet
little thing, trembling at every breeze, and therefore loving to
shelter herself under the protection of his “heart of oak.”
Well, now, a woman born to millions doesn’t grow up a birch at all; she
doesn’t want to be protected or sheltered, and she doesn’t know enough
to pretend that she does. She hasn’t the strength of the oak, but she
has all his arrogance; she hasn’t the flexibility and adaptability of
the birch, but she has her softness and slenderness of build. When the
tempest comes and blows away the wall of gold which protects her while
it lasts, her poor, little unyielding stem is very quickly snapped, and
she falls a wreck.
So, after all, I am afraid we must concede that riches are inimical to
love, that Plutus is the enemy rather than the ally of Eros, and that
millionaires, men and women, are not likely to become ideal lovers.
Shall we, then, accept the opposing theory, that bread and cheese
and kisses are enough for life, and that sensible, well-instructed
nineteenth century men and women are justified in marrying on such a
basis?
Since love does not thrive in palaces, is he likely to be hale, hearty,
and long-lived in the provincial cottage, with roses around the window,
birds on the boughs, and nothing in the larder or coal cellar?
Well, no, Common Sense declares he is not, and for once Sentiment finds
nothing to say, even when the little demon sneeringly declares, “When
Poverty comes in the door, Love flies out at the window, and the ideal
cottage has broad casement windows set wide open so that he can leave
without too much trouble.”
The beginnings of poverty, combined with love, are by no means
unendurable. The fond pair, in all the pride and glory of their proud
contempt of fitting surroundings, and all that sort of thing, take
possession of their cottage in the country or their cheap flat in the
city, and bravely begin life. Phyllis is going to do the trifling
little amount of housekeeping for herself, while Corydon pursues the
avocation that is to provide the bread and cheese.
For a month, or perhaps three or four, the wheels of the domestic
machine run upon velvet. Phyllis washes the cup and plate used by
Corydon with a tremulous joy in thinking that it is both her privilege
and her duty to do so, and he springs from his couch at peep of dawn
to light the fire, fill the teakettle, bring in the coals--in fact,
do everything that a man may do to help the angel who has deigned to
assume human form and minister to him. Each vies with each in making
things light and pleasant for the other, and little inconveniences are
laughed to scorn or welcomed as opportunities to prove how well they
can be borne for love’s sweet sake.
Phyllis has her trousseau, which, however simple, is at least new,
and in perfect order, and probably Corydon has provided himself with
a new outfit of shirts and underwear; so there is no mending to do,
and no yearnings after a new dress or hat. But, not to dilate upon a
process as inevitable as it is painful, this beatific condition comes
to an end. He gets tired of building fires and fetching coals. He wants
to sleep awhile in the morning and comes home at night too tired to
perform the tasks set aside for him.
Worse than this, he is annoyed to find Phyllis too much worn and
fretted with her daily routine to be good company. The little domestic
details that used to interest him while they were novelties bore and
disgust him, now that a querulous tone of complaint runs through
them, and finally he snaps and snarls, and says something impatient
at hearing that the grate of the stove needs to be taken out, or that
a great horrid rat has been seen in the cellar, and he must get a
trap and set it, or that the grocer’s boy did not bring the eggs for
breakfast, and will he go down and get them?
As for Phyllis, well, it is delightful to wash a plate and cup and
knife and fork and spoon for the man you love, a hundred times, or
five hundred, if you love him very much, but when it comes to five
thousand times and five times five thousand, it does become monotonous
to the fondest and truest heart that ever beat. Then, besides
the personal dishes of the beloved, there is an array of prosaic
disagreeable pots and pans, gridirons and frying-pans, not at all
pleasant to handle for even the first three months, and rapidly growing
intolerable as the months roll on.
Then there is the inexorable routine of the daily duties of life, hard
enough to make attractive if you have no need of laboring personally in
them, but liable to become a crushing burden if body as well as mind is
compelled to always be in harness and at work. Then the clothes wear
out and must be mended and altered and renewed, and if the poverty of
our young couple is an absolute fact, and not a pretty fancy, the young
wife has to add this labor to that of housekeeping.
She grows thin and haggard and fretful. She no longer puts flowers
on the breakfast table, nor folds the napkins in fantastic forms. She
no longer makes a pretty toilet to welcome her husband’s return at
night, and in fact she feels that he would hardly notice it if she did,
for his brow is apt to be clouded and his voice sullen as he says in
one form or another, “We must manage to spend less money instead of
launching out into new clothes and a servant, and all that you seem to
require.”
Then come the babies, and then--then comes the sad “repenting at
leisure.” It is not a cheerful picture, and we need not treat it in
a pre-Raphaelite spirit, bringing out all its sordid features and
details; but allow me to say to all whom it may concern that it is a
picture from life coming under my own observation not once alone, but
many times, and very likely to reproduce itself in the experience of
any one who chooses to attempt “love in a cottage” on a very limited
foundation.
Must we say, then, that poverty is also inimical to love; that the
goddess Poverta, celebrated by George Sand as one of the most
desirable of the Parnassian royal family, is as little likely to abide
comfortably with Eros as is her brother Plutus?
Well, yes, I think so. In fact, were I compelled to choose, I should
select the loveless wealthy marriage to the loveless poor marriage,
for in the former case the ill-mated couple can retreat to the extreme
limits of a very long chain, and all sorts of servitors and middlemen
and distractions come in between and enable the discordant couple to
forget their discordance in a multitude of other interests.
Marriage without love is a very miserable condition, but far more
miserable if, through poverty, the married pair are forced into
constant companionship and the sight and sound of each other’s worries
and complaints.
Happiness lies in the single region, sang the old Latin poet thousands
of years ago, and nothing has been said since to supersede his
utterance. Nothing is so desirable in its extreme as in its _juste
milieu_, and most certainly this axiom applies to the substantial
basis of married life. Two persons of sympathetic tastes, temper,
habits and aims, marrying upon an income sufficient to gratify those
tastes and habits, and to continue the pursuits they have enjoyed
before marriage, stand a far better chance for a happy life than if
they were enormously wealthy or extremely poor. Especially is this the
case if the wife has a little money of her own, enough for her personal
wants, and to make little presents to her husband as well as to other
friends. If she has nothing of her own, it is a safeguard to her future
happiness for her friends to insist upon her future husband’s making
some small settlement upon her and her future children.
A man respects his wife a good deal more if he does not keep her petty
purse, and the wife loves the husband a good deal more if she does not
have to ask for and account for every penny she expends.
IV.
AMERICAN HUSBANDS.
There is nothing new under the sun; nothing whatever.
If that is not a new saying, it is a very true one, and most true
things are old, and most old things are true, so that the wonder is
why they have not been accepted and done with long ago. The reason, I
suppose, is that every new generation, every new individual, in fact,
insists upon acquiring his own information for himself, and scorns
“other men’s leavings.”
Certainly this question of international marriages is old. I remember
as a little child sitting up at a table to look at the pictures in a
big Bible, and my favorite was a very spirited cartoon, representing
the Benjaminites descending upon the vineyards of Shiloh, I believe it
was, and each man seizing a struggling maiden to carry away to be made
his wife. I used to clamor, they tell me, to be shown the “Gentlemen of
Benjamin,” as I called it.
There in that same old Bible we are told that the sons of God married
the daughters of men, probably the earliest recorded instance of
international marriages.
Later on in life I learned the story of the rape of the Sabines, and
pondered much upon the probable after-life of those unwilling brides,
and even ventured in my cynical young mind to wish that a fleet of
Sabines might sail into the Gulf of Mexico, and carry away certain
obnoxious elderly maids from the environs of New Orleans, my native
city.
Neither history nor tradition tells us how any of these international
marriages prospered, but I am inclined to judge, badly. I dare say
the sons of God, whoever they may have been, were prim and priggish,
and soon concluded that the daughters of men were a bad lot, and they
were sorry they had undertaken their conversion. And I dare say those
merry maids of Shiloh sighed more than once for the pleasant vineyards
whence they had been torn, and the careless dances which had been their
principal occupation.
As for the Sabine brides, one can well imagine the remarks they would
upon occasion make to their bridegrooms, or rather to their masters,
upon the rude fashion of their wooing, and how often, in whatever
language Sabines used, they would say:
“What else could I expect from such a brute as you showed yourself that
day?” And probably the Sabine gentleman responded with a contemptuous
flip of his callous fingers or perhaps a touch of his whip.
William of Normandy, wishing to make an international marriage with
Matilda of Flanders, waylaid her as she came from church, dragged her
from her palfrey, rolled her in the dirt, and gave her a good beating
with his stirrup leathers. I believe it was after that episode that she
and her maidens embroidered the Bayeux tapestries in his honor, so I
suppose that she was neither maimed in body nor unforgiving in spirit.
But, for all that, I have not the smallest doubt that, in moments of
conjugal unreserve, Matilda often alluded to the leathering scene, and
William as often lamented that their acquaintance had not ended there.
But if one goes into royal international marriages there is no end
really to the unhappy histories written between the lines of grave
annals of State.
The French brides of English kings, with their pathetic attempts
to import a little of their national gayety and grace into insular
commonplace; the devout Spanish infantas, who found their religion
either the deadly horror or the flippant scorn of the French and
English courts; the haughty Austrian, Maria Louisa, scorning the
Corsican-Frenchman to whom she had been bartered; that other
unfortunate arch-duchess, Marie Antoinette, whom the French accused
before all things of being an Austrian (l’Autrichienne)--in fact, the
list is endless of unhappy royal international marriages, and we leave
them as we find them for warning lights.
In our own day and time we have plenty of examples ready at hand.
Probably every one of us is personally cognizant of some international
marriage and can answer for ourselves whether, as a general thing,
these marriages have been successful. Those which I have observed have
not, or at least not when the bride was an American and the bridegroom
of another nationality. The truth is, that American men make the very
best husbands of any men in the world, and American girls are trained
in their ideas of the relative obligations of husbands and wives
by what they observe at home of their own parents, and are utterly
ignorant of what any other than an American man expects of his wife.
The American, sincerely and unconsciously, respects and admires woman
as a class. He feels that she is a creature to be shielded, protected,
petted, caressed, not only while she is a young maiden whom he is
wooing, but after she becomes a wife and mother. I suppose there is
no civilized woman in the world possessed of so much honorable freedom
as the American wife. I say honorable freedom as distinguishing her
condition from that of the women of the _demi monde_ in Paris and
other places, who have secured for themselves a sort of freedom, or
rather lawlessness, which can certainly not be styled _honorable_.
No, certainly, there is no woman in the world with more possibilities
of happiness before her than an American woman married to a typical
American man. There are other men in the world who make better lovers.
Romeo, the pattern and model of lovers, could not possibly have been an
American. Othello wooed Desdemona as never American wooed or could woo.
One can hardly imagine General Lee, for instance, recapitulating his
battles and making much of his “hairbreadth escapes by sea and land”
for the edification of a young lady whom he wished to marry. And yet
I, for one, would rather have been Mrs. Lee than Mrs. Othello, or
even Mrs. Romeo Montague, for even as the Moor killed his wife from
jealousy, the Italian certainly would have neglected and slighted his
while he sang under the balcony of some other Juliet. True, he would
have expected her to take the same liberty so long as she didn’t get
found out, but that state of things can hardly be classed under the
head of happy marriages.
All men of the Latin races--Italians, Frenchmen, Spaniards,
Portuguese--are endowed by nature with the gift of love-making. They
can cast a look across the room a hundred times more eloquent than any
word a Saxon could say on the fairest moonlight night that ever shone.
Give him the moonlight night, and he not only looks but speaks like
Apollo, like the sirens, like Mephistopheles himself, who is, as all
accounts agree, the most fascinating creature in the world until you
become too well acquainted with him.