All matches will not blaze on the first trial, and there are those that with the most indefatigable coaxings never show a spark. They may indeed leave in their trail phosphorescent streaks; but you can no more light your cigar at them than you can kindle your heart at the covered wife-trails which the infernal gossiping old match-makers will lay in your path.
Was there ever a bachelor of seven and twenty, I wonder, who has not been haunted by pleasant old ladies and trim, excellent, good-natured married friends, who talk to him about nice matches—“very nice matches,” matches which never go off? And who, pray, has not had some kind old uncle to fill two sheets for him (perhaps in the time of heavy postages) about some most eligible connection—“of highly respectable parentage!”
What a delightful thing, surely, for a withered bachelor to bloom forth in the dignity of an ancestral tree! What a precious surprise for him, who has all his life worshiped the wing-heeled Mercury, to find on a sudden a great stock of preserved and most respectable Penates!
—In God’s name—thought I, puffing vehemently—what is a man’s heart given him for, if not to choose, where his heart’s blood, every drop of it is flowing? Who is going to dam these billowy tides of the soul, whose roll is ordered by a planet greater than the moon—and that planet—Venus? Who is going to shift this vane of my desires, when every breeze that passes in my heaven is keeping it all the more strongly, to its fixed bearings?
Besides this, there are the money matches, urged upon you by disinterested bachelor friends, who would be very proud to see you at the head of an establishment. And I must confess that this kind of talk has a pleasant jingle about it; and is one of the cleverest aids to a bachelor’s day-dreams, that can well be imagined. And let not the pouting lady condemn me, without a hearing.
It is certainly cheerful to think—for a contemplative bachelor—that the pretty ermine which so sets off the transparent hue of your imaginary wife, or the lace which lies so bewitchingly upon the superb roundness of her form—or the graceful bodice, trimmed to a line, which is of such exquisite adaptation to her lithe figure, will be always at her command—nay, that these are only units among the chameleon hues, under which you shall feed upon her beauty! I want to know if it is not a pretty cabinet picture for fancy to luxuriate upon—that of a sweet wife, who is cheating hosts of friends into love, sympathy and admiration, by the modest munificence of her wealth? Is it not rather agreeable, to feed your hopeful soul upon that abundance which, while it supplies her need, will give a range to her loving charities—which will keep from her brow the shadows of anxiety, and will sublime her gentle nature by adding to it the grace of an angel of mercy?
Is it not rich, in those days when the pestilent humors of bachelorhood hang heavy on you, to foresee in that shadowy realm, where hope is a native, the quiet of a home, made splendid with attractions; and made real by the presence of her who bestows them? Upon my word—thought I, as I continued puffing—such a match must make a very grateful lighting of one’s inner sympathies; nor am I prepared to say that such associations would not add force to the most abstract love imaginable.
Think of it for a moment—what is it that we poor fellows love? We love, if one may judge for himself, over his cigar—gentleness, beauty, refinement, generosity and intelligence—and far above these, a returning love, made up of all these qualities, and gaining upon your love, day by day, and month by month, like a sunny morning gaining upon the frosts of night.
But wealth is a great means of refinement; and it is a security for gentleness, since it removes disturbing anxieties; and it is a pretty promoter of intelligence, since it multiplies the avenues for its reception; and it is a good basis for a generous habit of life; it even equips beauty, neither hardening its hand with toil, nor tempting the wrinkles to come early. But whether it provokes greatly that returning passion—that abnegation of soul—that sweet trustfulness, and abiding affection, which are to clothe your heart with joy, is far more doubtful. Wealth, while it gives so much, asks much in return; and the soul that is grateful to mammon, is not over ready to be grateful for intensity of love. It is hard to gratify those who have nothing left to gratify.
Heaven help the man who having wearied his soul with delays and doubts, or exhausted the freshness and exuberance of his youth—by a hundred little dallyings with love—consigns himself at length to the issues of what people call a nice match—whether of money, or of a family!