Part 12 (2/2)
VII. ”The irony of Fate! The one soul in all the universe that is deep enough to comprehend mine, the peerless queen of womankind, she for whom I have waited all my life, is pledged to another! I shall go mad if I bear this any longer. I simply must have her. 'All is fair in love and war'--I'll go and ask her!”
[Sidenote: Gold-Brick Tactics]
When one man alludes to another as a ”confidence man,” it is no distinguis.h.i.+ng mark, for they instinctively adopt gold-brick tactics when seeking woman in marriage.
Those exquisite hands shall never perform a single menial task! Yet, after marriage, Her Ladys.h.i.+p finds that she is expected to be a cook, nurse, housekeeper, seamstress, chambermaid, waitress, and practical plumber. This is an unconscious tribute to the versatility of woman, since a man thinks he does well if he is a specialist in any one line.
Her slightest wish shall be his law! Yet not only are wishes of no avail, but even pleading and prayer fall upon deaf ears. It will be his delight to see that she wants for nothing, yet she is reduced to the necessity of asking for money--even for carfare--and a man will do for his bicycle what his wife would ask in vain.
Many of the matrimonial infelicities of which both men and women bitterly complain may be traced to the gold-brick delusion. A woman marries in the hope of having a lover and discovers, too late, that she merely has a boarder who is most difficult to please.
[Sidenote: A Certain Pitiful Change]
There is a certain pitiful change which comes with marriage. The sound of her voice would thrill him to his finger-tips, the touch of her hand make his throat ache, and the light in her eyes set the blood to singing in his veins. With possession, ecstasy changes to content, and the loving woman, dreaming that she may again find what she has so strangely lost, tries to waken the old feeling by pathetic little ways which women read at once, but men never know anything about.
In a way, woman is to blame, but not so much. Her superior insight should give her a better understanding of courts.h.i.+p. A man may mean what he says--at the time he says it--but men and seasons change.
[Sidenote: Value and Proportion]
The happiness of the after-years depends largely upon her sense of value and proportion. No woman of artistic judgment would crowd her rooms with bric-a-brac, even though comfort were not lacking. Pictures hung together so closely that the frames touch lose beauty. s.p.a.ce has distinct value, and solid colours, judiciously used, create a harmony impossible to obtain by the continuous use of figured fabrics.
Yet many a woman whose house is a model of taste, whose rooms are s.p.a.cious and restful, insists upon crowding her marriage with the bric-a-brac of violent affection. She is not content with undecorated s.p.a.ces; with interludes of friends.h.i.+p and the appreciation which is felt, rather than spoken. She demands the constant a.s.surances, the unfailing devotion of the lover, and thus loses her atmosphere--and her content.
It seems to be a settled thing that men shall do the courting before marriage and women afterward. n.o.body writes articles on ”How to Make a Wife Happy,” and the innumerable cook books, like an army of gra.s.shoppers, consume and devastate the land.
If women did not demand so much, men in general would be more thoughtful. If it were understood that even after marriage man was still to be the lover, the one who sent roses to his sweetheart would sometimes bring them to his wife. The pretty courtesies would not so often be forgotten.
[Sidenote: The Tender Thought]
If the tender thought were in some way shown, and the loving word which leaps to the lips were never forced back, but always spoken, marriage and even life itself would take on new beauty and charm. If a woman has daily evidence of a man's devotion, no matter in how small a way, her hunger and thirst for love are bountifully a.s.suaged. Misunderstandings rapidly grow into coldness and neglect, and foolish woman, blind with love, adopts retribution and recrimination as her weapons. There are a great many men who love their wives simply because they know they would be scalped if they didn't.
Making an issue of a little thing is one of the surest ways to spoil happiness. One's personal pride is felt to be vitally injured by surrender, but there is no quality of human nature so nearly royal as the ability to yield gracefully. It shows small confidence in one's own nature to fear that compromise lessens self-control. To consider constantly the comfort and happiness of another is not a sign of weakness but of strength.
[Sidenote: Spoiled Children]
Too many men and women are only spoiled children at heart. The little maid of five or six takes her doll and goes home because her playmates have been unkind. Twenty years later she packs her trunk and goes to her mother's because of some quarrel which had an equally childish beginning.
But the hurts of the after-years are not so easily healed. The children kiss and make up no later than the next day, but, grown to manhood and womanhood, they consider it far beneath their dignity and importance to say ”Forgive me,” and thus proceed to the matrimonial garbage box by way of the divorce court.
Lovers are wont to consider a marriage license a free ticket to Paradise. Sometimes happiness may be freely given by the dispenser of earthly blessings, but it is more often bought. It is a matter of temperament rather than circ.u.mstance, and is to be had only by the two who work for it together, forgiving, forgetting, graciously yielding, and looking forward to the perfect understanding which will surely come.
Matches are not all made in heaven. Even the parlour variety sometimes smell of brimstone, and Cupid is blamed for many which are made by cupidity. The gossips and the busybodies would die of mal-nutrition were it not for marriage and its complications.
[Sidenote: The Tabbies]
Two people who have quarrelled cheerfully before marriage and whose engagement has been broken three or four times often surprise the tabbies who prophesy misfortune by settling down into post-nuptial content. Two who are universally p.r.o.nounced to be ”perfectly suited to each other” are soon absolutely miserable. Marriage is the one thing which everyone knows more about than people who are intimately concerned.
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