GORG. I care neither for elegant ways nor songs. I tell you marriage is a holy and sacred affair; to begin with that is to act like honest people.
[Footnote: The original has a play on words. Madelon says, in addressing her father, vous devriez un pen vous faire apprendre le bel air des choses, upon which he answers, je n'ai que faire ni d'air ni de chanson. Air means tune as well as look, appearance.]
MAD. Good Heavens! If everybody was like you a love-story would soon be over. What a fine thing it would have been if Cyrus had immediately espoused Mandane, and if Aronce had been married all at once to Clélie.
[Footnote: Cyrus and Mandane are the two principal characters of Mademoiselle de Scudéry's novel Artamene, on the Grand Cyrus; Aronce and Clélie of the novel Clélie, by the same author.]
GORG. What is she jabbering about?
MAD. Here is my cousin, father, who will tell as well as I that matrimony ought never to happen till after other adventures. A lover, to be agreeable, must understand how to utter fine sentiments, to breathe soft, tender, and passionate vows; his courtship must be according to the rules. In the first place, he should behold the fair one of whom he becomes enamoured either at a place of worship, [Footnote: See note 15, page 33.] or when out walking, or at some public ceremony; or else he should be introduced to her by a relative or a friend, as if by chance, and when he leaves her he should appear in a pensive and melancholy mood. For some time he should conceal his passion from the object of his love, but pay her several visits, in every one of which he ought to introduce some gallant subject to exercise the wits of all the company. When the day comes to make his declarations—which generally should be contrived in some shady garden-walk while the company is at a distance—it should be quickly followed by anger, which is shown by our blushing, and which, for a while, banishes the lover from our presence. He finds afterwards means to pacify us, to accustom us gradually to hear him depict his passion, and to draw from us that confession which causes us so much pain. After that come the adventures, the rivals who thwart mutual inclination, the persecutions of fathers, the jealousies arising without any foundation, complaints, despair, running away with, and its consequences. Thus things are carried on in fashionable life, and veritable gallantry cannot dispense with these forms. But to come out point-blank with a proposal of marriage,—to make no love but with a marriage-contract, and begin a novel at the wrong end! Once more, father, nothing can be more tradesmanlike, and the mere thought of it makes me sick at heart.
GORG. What deuced nonsense is all this? That is highflown language with a vengeance!
CAT. Indeed, uncle, my cousin hits the nail on the head. How can we receive kindly those who are so awkward in gallantry. I could lay a wager they have not even seen a map of the country of Tenderness, and that Love-letters, Trifling attentions, Polite epistles, and Sprightly verses, are regions to them unknown.
[Footnote: The map of the country of Tenderness (la carte de Tendre) is found in the first part of Clélie (see note 2, page 146); Love-letter (Billetdoux); Polite epistle (Billet galant); Trifling attentions (Petit Soins); Sprightly verses (Jolts vers), are the names of villages to be found in the map, which is a curiosity in its way.]
Do you not see that the whole person shews it, and that their external appearance is not such as to give at first sight a good opinion of them. To come and pay a visit to the object of their love with a leg without any ornaments, a hat without any feathers, a head with its locks not artistically arranged, and a coat that suffers from a paucity of ribbons. Heavens! what lovers are these! what stinginess in dress! what barrenness of conversation! It is not to be allowed; it is not to be borne. I also observed that their ruffs