A girl's first engagement is peculiarly sweet: long does she remember, long meditatively dwell upon, its pettiest incidents. For, if any man dared give utterance to so outrageous an assumption,
The emoluments of a promise to marry are as sweet to the donatress as undoubtedly they are to the accepter.—And why not, pray? Nevertheless,
A certain practical sobriety supervenes upon subsequent affairs of the heart. For
The recurrence of love is apt to spoil its romance. And yet—and yet—
It is a question which woman after woman has put herself, in vain, whether 't would have been wiser to have accepted and retained the romantic love of unthinking youth, or to have waited for the more sober affection of the years of discretion.
Perhaps a girl hardly knows all that is meant by that thing called "love" or what is entailed upon her by that thing called an "engagement". She has played with love so much, that when a real and serious love is offered her, she still thinks it the toy that amused her. But
Soon enough does the man, if he is earnest—and a man never proposes unless he is in earnest—enlighten the girl of his choice: for
To a man, love never is a toy—though mere lust may be:
Men never play with love, as do girls: they play with lust,—as they play with bats and balls and fire-arms;
When men fall in love, they fall in love with a vengeance; and