She is always be-guide-philosopher-and-friending me. I resent it. A man of forty does not need the counsels of an elderly woman destitute of intellect. I believe there are some women who are firmly convinced that their sheer sex has imbued them with all the qualities of genius. To-day my aunt tackled me on the subject of marriage. I ought to marry. I asked why. It appeared it was every man’s duty.
“From what point of view?” I asked. “The mere propagation of the human race, or the providing of a superfluous young woman with a means of livelihood? If it is the former, then, in my opinion, there are too many people in the world already; and if the latter, I’m afraid I’m not sufficiently altruistic.”
“You are so funny!” laughed my aunt.
I was not aware of being the least bit funny.
“But, seriously,” she continued, “you must marry.” She is a woman who has an irritating way of speaking in Italics. “Are you aware that if you have no son the title will become extinct?”
“And if it does,” I cried, “who on this earth will care a half-penny-bun?”
I am growing tired of the title. At first it was rather amusing. Now it appears it is registered in Heaven’s chancery and hedged about with divine ordinances. Only the other day an unknown parson requested me to open a church bazaar, and I gathered he had received his instructions direct from the Almighty.
“Why, every one would care,” exclaimed my aunt, genuinely shocked. “It would be monstrous. You owe it to your descendants as well as to your ancestors. Besides,” she added, with apparent irrelevance, “a man in your position ought to live up to it.”
“I do,” said I, “just up to it.”
“Now you are pretending you don’t understand me. You ought to marry money!”