"Find me the man who isn't under the impression that some woman is hopelessly in love with him; and only because she has taken such pains to smile and coo at him, which she generally does to keep her hand in; any man is to her an instrument on which she, as an artist, finds it serviceable to play a few scales. To call men the ruling sex,"--and my friend laughed till I saw every one of her beautiful teeth,--"they are the ruled sex, and they get married by the women who want them most."
She evidently agreed with Thackeray. I don't, as I explained before.
"My dear, how many an innocent young thing has said 'Yes' when 'he' has had no earthly intention of asking for anything--certainly not for her dear little hand.
"'May I?' was possibly all he said, but he looked three thrilling volumes. 'Yes,' she whispered innocently, 'but do first ask papa.' How can he explain to her that the question trembling on his lips was whether he should bring her a lemon-squash or a strawberry-ice. He asked papa and they lived happily ever after, and it answered just as well. Now what I wonder is," she concluded, "which is the stupider--he or she?"
One hasn't time to soft-soap one's relatives. For its successful use there is required a certain exhilaration of spirits which familiarity does not encourage. It is more easy to be charming to one's acquaintances or intimate enemies than to the bosom of one's family. One can be kinder to one's own, but more charming to the outside world, alas!
A woman doesn't go on for ever coquetting with her husband--it is a pity, but it's true. Perhaps if it were less true there would be fewer divorces. When, in the happy past, your husband was your lover and he looked at you with adoring eyes, why, then you could be charming,--at least for a few hours, because to be charming longer gets on one's nerves. Later, when you are married and he won't get up in the morning, and you say to him severely, "Samuel, are you never going to get up? It's nine o'clock, and cook says she'll give notice, for she can't and she won't live in such a late family," and your Samuel grunts, turns over, and hurriedly takes forty more winks, how can you possibly be charming just then?
Nor can you murmur to your Samuel that he is the most interesting man you ever met, and that his brain is superior to all other brains. He doesn't care a rap what you think about his brains, and he'd much rather you wouldn't bother him but go downstairs; and so you do go downstairs in that very unbecoming frock of your pre-married days in which you wouldn't have had him see you for worlds. But now it has come again to the fore, ever since the time Samuel said pleasantly--he certainly has no talent for soft-soap--that after people have been married a year neither knows how the other looks. This from your Samuel, for whose sake you ran up an awful dressmaker's bill in other days. So you unearth your hideous frock with a desperate sigh.