“I’m in for it,” thought Leicester. “Well, what must be, must; the sun will be off here in about half-an-hour, and I suppose I can endure him for that space of time.” He only said, however, holding out his cigar-case languidly, “Can I offer you one?”
“Ar—many thanks, you’re one of the few men whose taste I can, rely on; but—ar—really, the things they sell now, and pretend to call genuine, are such trash, that—ar—I am forced to import my own. I sent out an agent to Cuba express—ar—at least, Robinson, who supplies my club—ar—the Caryatides, you know—sent him on a hint from me, and I can’t match the cigars he brought me anywhere; I’ve never met with anything like them. Ask your brother; he knows them—ar—I let him have half a box as the greatest favour.”
“Bell lives on cigars and gin-and-water when he’s in his native state,” returned Leicester, slightly altering his position so that he could rest his back more conveniently against a statue. “If he’s been going too fast, and gets out of condition, he takes a course of that sort of thing, and it always brings him right again; it’s like turning a screwy horse out to grass.”
De Grandeville, who had appeared somewhat abstracted during this interesting record of the domestic habits of Lord Bellefield, changed the conversation by observing, “Ar—you see, when a man of a certain—ar—position in society gets—ar—towards middle life—ar—say, three or four-and-thirty, it appears to me that it adds very much to his weight to—ar—to——”
“To drink brown stout instead of pale ale,” exclaimed Leicester more eagerly than his wont. “I observed you did so at——, when we were treating the incorruptible electors, and it struck me as a decided mistake.”
“Ar—yes, I believe—that is, of course—you are right; but that was not exactly what I was going to observe,” returned De Grandeville, slightly embarrassed. “In fact, I was going to say that it adds to a man’s weight in society, increases his influence, and improves his general position to be—ar—well married!”
“About that I scarcely know; it’s not a matter to decide on hastily,” returned Leicester, coolly lighting a fresh cigar, which, being of an obstinate disposition, required much scientific management and considerable hard puffing to induce it to perform properly. “In regard to (puff) marriage, Mr. De Grandeville, looking at it philosophically—and I can assure you it’s a subject on which I’ve expended much (puff, puff) serious thought,—looking at it in a reasonable businesslike point of view, it becomes a mere (puff) affair of debtor and creditor,—a question of what you lose and what you gain. Let us try the matter by various tests and see how the account stands. We’ll begin with the watchwords of the day, for instance: ‘Liberty, Fraternity, and Equality.’ Liberty,—a single man can do as he likes without consulting anybody; a married man can do as he likes only when his wife shares the inclination, which, as no two people ever look at anything in exactly the same point of view, appears a somewhat stringent restriction. Fraternity,—a single man may choose his friends where he feels inclined, male or female, as it may have pleased Providence to create them; a married man dare not, unless he has a taste for domestic misery, and possesses eyes which are nail-proof, cultivate a female friendship, and somehow one feels if one were married one should not exactly wish to have a set of men always dangling about one’s house. Equality,—a single man, if he has received a gentleman’s education, wears a good coat, and has wit enough to keep himself warm, is anybody’s equal; a married man must bear all his wife’s burdens as well as his own, and doesn’t get asked by the Browns because the Smiths have told them her great-grandfather was transported for stealing a pewter pot. Now, let us look at the per contra side. A single man soon gets tired of his unlimited Liberty; there’s no fun in having your own way if you’ve no one to contradict you. A little opposition becomes a positive luxury, and this you’re sure to obtain by matrimony. Then, as to Fraternity, friends are better than acquaintances, certainly, just as a mule is preferable to a jackass, but they’re not much comfort to one after all. My most intimate friend lives in Ceylon and writes to me once in five years about hunting elephants. Now, your wife is part of your goods and chattels, belongs to you as completely as your bootjack, and when in hours of indolence you wish to sit with your soul in slippers, she, if she is worth her salt, is ready to pull off the psychological boots that are pinching your mind, and prevent the dolce far niente from becoming meaningless and insipid. Lastly, there’s no such Equality in the world as between husband and wife when they are really suited to each other, appreciate their relative positions justly, and endeavour to make practice and principle coincide. These are my ideas regarding the marriage state, Mr. De Grandeville; but ’tis no use discussing the matter. Society has long since decided the question in favour of wedlock, and there are only enough exceptions to prove the rule. Byron enunciated a great truth when he declared:
“‘Man was not formed to live alone;’
the animal’s gregarious, sir, and the solitary system is totally opposed to all its tastes and habits.”
So saying, Charley emitted a long puff of smoke, and caressing his whiskers, calmly awaited his companion’s reply; but this demands a fresh chapter.