Complete Project Gutenberg Will

hy of the most splendid fate that marriage could have in store for any of her sex. Women often make each other the idols of such worship; but I could not

, and I chose to think the husband modestly found h

n a young girl has in her whole life. She thinks she wishes some one to be devoted to her, but she really wishes some one to let her be devoted to him; and how passively, how negatively, she must manage to accomplish her self-sacrifice! He, on the contrary, means to go conquering and enslaving forward; to be in and out of love right and left, and to end, after many years of triumph, in the possession of the best and wisest and fairest of her sex. I know the breed, my dear sir; I have been a young man myself. We men have liberty, we have initiative; w

ng to do his very best in the circumstances. His wife looked round at him, but did not speak. In fact, they none of them spoke after the first words of

cleared his throat: but I was intent upon him, for I thought that these sounds preluded an overture (I am not s

aste to answer: "Well, nominally at eight o'clock; but the first half-hour is usually taken up in tuning the instrum

all feel at having a thing understated in that way. His wife

o such rush as that. Haven't yo

out as comfortable outside of the house." I perceived that he maintained his independence of my superior knowledg

rk had been made to me; but here I drew the line out of self

er again. I understood, and I freely forgave her. If my beard had been brown instead of grey I should have been an adventure; but to the eye of girlhood

question of his. I divined that he would be glad to withdraw from the overture he had made; he may have thought from my readiness to meet him half way that I might be one of tho

a little too damp here,

ain for some minutes. Then the wife said again, but this time to the friend, "I don't kn

know bu

at she should have a sweet voice added to all that beauty and grace of hers; but she had a sweet voice, very tender and melodious, with a plangent note in it that touched me and charmed me. Beautiful and graceful as she was, she had lacked atmosphere before, and now suddenly she had atmospher

make out whether it is a personal tribute to some specific woman whom they regard differently from all the rest of her sex, or whether they choose to know in her for the nouce the abstract woman who is better than woman in the concrete. I am sure I have never seen men of any other race abandon themselves to such a luxury of respect as these black and grey bearded Spaniards of leaden complexion showed this dumpy personification of womanhood, with their prominent eyes bent in homage upon her, and their hands trembling with readiness to seize their hats off in reverence. It appeared pre

ry summer, probably in the belief that they saw a great deal of social gaiety there. This made me think, by a natural series of transitions, of the

y sought my vicinity in a sense of their loneliness and helplessness, which they hoped I would not divine, but which I divined instantly. Still, I thought it best not to sho

e take your pro

rtainly,

fe, who gave it in turn to the young girl. She studied it very br

I entreated. "I've

and she and the wife looked hard at the man, whom t

ed, "Have you been

ood deal. My wife and I have be

ance, I fancied, of triumph, as if they had been talking about me, and I had now confirmed the g

ed, "should you say h

s of himself. I tried to treat his question, by the quantity and quality of my answer, as one of the most natural things in the world; and I probably deceived them all by this effort, though I am sure

ich depend upon the great houses for the entertainment of the

eal going on there, either. If you want that sort of thing you will have to go to some of the great hotels. We have our little amusements, but they're all rather mild." I kept talking to the man, but really addressing myself to the women. "There's someth

ly, even if the man did not. The wife drew a lo

more hungrily, I fa

stop till the music began again, and I had to stop. By the time the piece was finished I had begun to have my misgivings, and I

ly, as if she were quite past ex

timidly to me, "Well, good-evening," as if she might be venturing too far; and her h

rare and thrilling kind. I believed that if I could present it to her duly, it would interest her as much as it had inte

ppointed of a good time ever since we saw that poor little Kitty Ellison with

ave my romance treated as so stale a situation, though I was conscious now that it did want perfect novelty. "It's precisely for that reaso

anything, Basil, unless y

be done." The notion amused me; I went on to play with it, and imagined Saratoga, by a joint effort of

ay on at York Harbour if the Herricks want them so much. They would hate it

fter having trodden my romance in the dust, she was willing I should pick it up again

hinking of angel

't say she was an

ing back. What did you try to do for those peo

ey asked me, an

brag the

ry, I understa

they will come here, and you will have your romance on your hands for th