Flirting for Revenue Only
I am a Private Corporation.
My capital stock is a pretty face, a clear head, and pleasant manners.
I was incorporated by the "social legislature" four winters ago. Mamma was the active, successful lobbyist. My father was the silent, financial lever absolutely necessary for the passage of the bill—opposition small.
The social Banking-House (our residence), on a fashionable avenue, had been erected years before. A great mass of brick and mortar—stone-front of course—not beautiful, but imposing. It was left unfurnished—a portion of it—until I was ready to start in upon my social career. That is quite a usual plan with people who are prospectively fashionable. They do nothing with the drawing-room, library, and reception-room until the daughter of the house is pronounced ready. The plastering, after a dry of eighteen years, has had plenty of time to settle, and is not apt to crack the costly papers or ruin the elaborate frescoes; and the wood-work no longer in danger of warping or opening too much.
My incorporation was an event. Business at once set in, and, with slight fluctuations, has continued ever since brisk and healthful. The venture has been a decided success. The constant, untiring skill of mamma, and the valuable experience of each gay season has enabled me to frequently increase the capital stock. For my face is more pretty than it was four years ago, and my manners are more easy and pleasing. Mamma says manners are every thing—and they are a great deal. I have grown to be somewhat of a woman of the world. I have met so many new people—strangers from all parts of the earth! I have been every where, and done so much. There is nothing local about me! Some people say that I am all things to all men; perhaps I am, for if I am not broad I am not any thing. I abhor narrow-mindedness! I am a trifle fraudulent in a harmless way, which I am free to confess is more than a trifle fascinating to most of the men I know. I smile, make eyes, sometimes sigh, and with many devices coax the masculine fancy into life, and for my sake. Yet, withal, I am said to be conscientious—very, in fact, and never intentionally deceive. My reputation is better, alas! than I deserve. My network is invisible but effectual; my weaving-power artless, but it is the art concealing the artful.
I am a Private Corporation! Therefore, I own all the stock. I constantly make loans, but I never sell. The collateral—either the many shades of love or the subtle changes of friendship—must be A No. 1 in every respect. It is collateral, not indorsements which I require. Paper not able to sustain itself is not considered worth much in my Banking-House (social).
It is my sweet expectation to retire from business whenever I chance to find—or rather when I am found—by the right purchaser. I often long for that time; I often picture to myself the undoubted delights of a domestic life, and—but in the meantime I carry on a carefully perfected system of
Flirting for Revenue Only.