No one knows us better than those who serve us, for whom we make no pretence to hypocrisy or ostentation of false virtues, and if a lady’s maid does not know how to make a psychological analysis of the young lady she can show us the most intimate secrets of her character. Noble, generous, and good natures never ill treat their servants; or they feel all that compassion for them which their position merits, and apply toward them the daily and domestic virtues of a tender and affectionate benevolence. Always doubt the character of those who are changing their servants frequently. They are nearly always ill disposed, and being unable to vent their evil instincts in higher circles, begin to torment their slaves at home.
They pour forth on the lady’s maid, dressmaker, or hairdresser all the disappointed vanity, hidden jealousy, bad temper, and anger of their petty social struggles.
Then if they feel the need of being despotic they satisfy it by using their power over those poor victims paid at so much a month, and condemned to live on the moral excrements of their masters. I know ladies of the highest financial and hereditary aristocracy who are not ashamed to beat their maids brutally and cruelly. If you succeed in learning this do not overlook it, do not pardon it, but fly the contact of one who will exercise her own evil-mindedness and despotism upon you, and later on, upon your children.
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I prophesy that when you have finished your examination on heredity and friendship, and that closer inquiry into your dear one’s home affairs, you will find the sister soul to your own—she with whom you will sing the hymn of perfect happiness all your life, the only perfect happiness, that of a union of two. But this is the rarest good fortune. In most cases you will find neither absolute discord nor ideal harmony, but a partial accord, which with labor and good will you will be able to convert gradually into perfect harmony.
If your love is great and deep, if it pours out from the viscera of your whole organism, if she loves you well and enough, rest assured that the rocks will fall to pieces, the mountains be levelled, and the thorns be removed, for love is the most skilled magician, and knows even how to convert gall into honey. Woman is cleverer than all the rest of the world in this thaumaturgic work, and you must really be the most stupid egotist, the most antipathetic creature in the whole universe, if your companion cannot succeed in making you agree with her after a few months. And yet, take care. This harmony ought not to be that of a victim resigned or a slave subjected; that would be an artificial agreement which lasts a short time only, and thrives but ill. It must be a slow and clever adaptation of the sharpness of the one to the roundness of the other. It must be an intelligent and tender acclimation to surroundings, tastes, and habits, so that the rebellious sprig may be bent without pain or breaking, so that the vine leaves may seem pleased at their connection with the pollard [4] which supports them, and the bright and ruddy bunches of grapes seem to smile with joy on foliage and pollard alike. Happiness, too, is a tree which requires a wise and loving cultivation. We men are the pollards; the vine is our companion who leans upon us, bound there by the withes of love and of reciprocal indulgence. Above all things marry a good woman, one, too, who loves you—not for the title you bear, not for the gold which fills your chests, but because she admires and esteems you, and is proud to bear your name.
[4] It is customary in Tuscany to plant pollards in the vineyards for the purpose of supporting the vines, and these are bound to the pollards with willow twigs.—Tr.
And then you may be sure that the little discords of character will be surmounted, and in the indulgence with which your companion so patiently bears with your defects you will find every day and every hour a proof of that love which will only cease with your last breath.