'Stay, there's F——'s niece; that's your mark.'
'Ah! now you're getting reasonable; think I could like the woman; saw her once at the opera.'
'And she has a pretty dowry and big expectations.'
A——'s face is getting radiant.
'Where can I meet her?'
'Madame B—— will give a little soirée on Thursday night; we shall invite her.'
Mdlle. F—— is trotted out like a filly at Tattersail's—her paces are shown—report favourable.
'Have you any objection to receiving Monsieur A—— as a suitor?' asks the nearest of kin.
Mademoiselle blushes, but is too well-bred to say no. Monsieur comes, dressed to death, spruce as if he stepped out of a bandbox, and mademoiselle is prepared to receive him, nearest of kin being always present. Mademoiselle has got her instructions; they were somewhat in the key of the admonition little boys make to the bears in the Jardin des Plantes: fais le beau, 'do the handsome.' Monsieur pays compliments to mademoiselle, always through the nearest of kin, and she, dear, well-bred creature, listens to monsieur with sweetest politeness, never betraying a vulgar desire to look into the face, much less into the heart, of the man who is to be her future guide through life, her partner in the tomb. Thus the comedy proceeds. Nearest of kin does the courting, which is not too painfully elongated. The trousseau is bought and exhibited. Monsieur buys the corbeille, which is ordinarily expected to amount in value to one-tenth of the dowry he gets with his wife (which dowry particular care is taken to settle on the wife herself). The banns are published; one day a party appears before the Mairie, and a commercial—we beg pardon, a marriage contract is signed, a supererogatory gallop to a neighbouring church takes place to satisfy conventionalism, and Mdlle. F—— becomes Madame A——. There is no love before marriage in nine cases out of ten; of the love which grows up after marriage we are too delicate to speak. It is understood—only sometimes it will happen that monsieur has a club and madame a cavalier eservente. And madame, dear, well-bred creature, endeavours to make up for the reserve imposed on mademoiselle, and it is perfectly astonishing to discover what a profound knowledge of the world and its schemes and slanders the shy young maiden of last week contrives to develop all at once in her married household.
The reader will have remarked that O'Hara received the announcement that his Irish friend had succeeded in his proposal without surprise. The sole reason was that O'Hara had been living sufficiently long in France to know that marriages are arranged with the same celerity that one would toss a pancake, and that if the financial requirements are satisfied it is easy to fulfil the exigencies of affection.