Her Royal Highness Woman

CHAPTER X

SORE TRIALS FOR PEOPLE IN LOVE – WILL LOVE TRIUMPH OVER THE AFFLICTIONS OF THE BODY?

The following reflections were suggested to me by a pitiful story that I heard a few days ago only. A young, beautiful girl, belonging to the best society, was engaged to be married. During her lover's absence she had typhoid fever. She recovered and is now quite well, but (the 'but' is terrible) she has not a single hair left on her head. Of course, she wears a wig, but she has tried every possible thing, consulted the most eminent specialists, to no avail. Her lover is returning very soon. He knew she was ill, but does not know the terrible misfortune which has befallen his beautiful fiancée. Will he marry her? Will his love be powerful enough to overlook the loss of woman's best ornament on his sweetheart's head? Will he be able to behold her with the wig off, and say to her: 'I love you just the same?' In a melodrama he would, but will he? I dare not answer the question. We do not live in heroic times nowadays, and you must not ask too much of man.

As physical beauty is an appanage far more precious to a woman than a man, the question may perhaps be better put in the following manner: If a man loves a woman, will her disfigurement – the loss of a limb, the loss of her hair, deafness, blindness, or any other calamity of this sort which may afflict her – destroy the love of that man for that woman?

It is all very well to say that love is the yearning of the soul, but it must be admitted that the man himself is closely associated with it, and that the face is the means of expressing what the soul feels. You can softly whisper 'I love you' in a woman's ear; but if the poor thing is deaf, you cannot shout these three words at her, much less blow them through a trumpet. If you doubt me, try it in a play, and you will see the effect it will infallibly produce on the audience. Why, they will roar. Deafness is terrible, so dull, so prosaic, so suggestive of old age; I have sometimes heard men wish their wives were dumb, but deaf never.

I remember once seeing a play at a Paris Boulevard theatre, frequented by the emotional portion of the Parisian public, in which the heroine, in the fourth act, appears with a thick veil over her face. She has had small-pox and she is sadly disfigured for life; she expects her lover, who is returning from the war. A year has elapsed since the curtain went down over the third act; she has just received a letter announcing his arrival safe and sound. She is happy, radiant; then she looks at herself in a glass and weeps bitterly; she has told him of her illness, but not of her misfortune; he knows nothing about it. Will he love her still when he sees her, or will he go away from her? The suspense is awful, and the situation dramatic. At last he appears on the threshold of the door, and stretches out his arms to her; she remains speechless, motionless, and the audience breathless. He rushes up to her to take her in his arms. With a dramatic gesture of the hands she bids him stand back. Then she tells him what has happened; but he is one of those worthy, undaunted heroes of the Boulevard melodramas whose love can triumph over all obstacles. He swears that it will make no difference to his sentiments; she lifts up her veil; then he falls at her feet and exclaims from the depths of his heart: 'I love you just the same, my darling.' (Tableau, cheers, and applause.) Of course he does not say to her that he finds her more beautiful than ever, and that the marks suit her style of beauty and all that sort of thing, but he swears again that his love has not altered, and the audience applaud this lofty sentiment, and the women say: 'That's a man!'

H'm! is it, though?

A friend who was with me on that occasion, and who is a bit of a cynic, said to me: 'There was only one possible dénouement for that play to give satisfaction to an audience that must go home perfectly persuaded that the hero and the heroine will be happy and in love with each other for ever and ever. The author missed a fine dramatic curtain. As the small-pox marks cannot be taken away, that man should have carried his love for that girl further than he did. He should have torn his eyes out in her presence. The sacrifice would have gone straight to her heart, and would have made the continuation of his love possible.'

'Well,' I said, 'yes, I see what you mean, but how do you know that the girl would have cared to marry a blind man? Maybe her love would not triumph over the difficulty.'

I may tell you that I knew a loving married couple who ceased to love each other, he because her hair turned white, and she because his turned outwards.

This is a psychological subject that may well puzzle the best sociologist.

I have not tried to answer the question, but merely intended to offer it for discussion.

However, this I will say to my fellow-men: 'I know how truly and deeply you love your wives and sweethearts, but let me advise you: Don't try the experiment; don't put your love to so severe a test. Take the greatest care of the said wives and sweethearts, and see that no accident happens to them, that no disease disfigures them or permanently injures their health. This is wisdom.'

CHAPTER XI

MAN VERSUS WOMAN IN LOVE

Man is capable of love as earnestly as woman is; but love is not the whole business of his life, whereas it is a woman's. When a child, she loves her doll; when a girl, her mother; when a woman, a man. She can feed on love and die of it. When a mother, she loves her children; when she dies, surrounded by beloved grandchildren, she may say that her life has been well filled.

I believe that a woman can love more than once. I have known widows remarry, and love their second husbands with the same devotion as their first.

A man really loves once only. I knew a man under fifty who was married three times. He was a good and devoted husband to his three wives, but he never really loved but the second. If he dies suddenly without having time to take all his precautions, the portrait of his second wife will be found on his heart.

The reason of this is that men and women love in different ways. A man loves because his whole being – heart, soul, and body – craves for a woman. A woman often gives herself to a man because it pleases her to be loved by him. For a man, love is the pleasure he feels in the company of a woman; for a woman, it is the enjoyment of the pleasure she gives to a man. A woman is proud to call herself a reward, and that is why all heroes appeal to her so much. Mirabeau was the plainest of men, with his face covered with smallpox marks, yet no man ever made so many conquests among women. Successful generals, explorers, great orators, authors, artists, singers, all appeal to women. They may not love them personally, but it affords them great pleasure to be loved by them. There is in every woman a craving for a man superior to herself, and that is why women who try to dominate men are such dismal failures.

To a woman love is sacred, her food, her life.

Never have a sneer at a woman or at a child. Whenever you feel sarcastic, exercise your talents on something else.

Never profane the words, 'I love you'; they may seal the fate of a woman; but when you have uttered these three words in great earnestness, and the woman has answered with that great religious, almost sad, smile that Victor Hugo called 'the smile of angels,' when, in a word, she is yours, place her on a pedestal, on an altar, and worship her. The world has nothing better to offer you.

A man can cure a woman of a man. Nothing can cure a man of a woman, unless it be that woman herself.

While on the subject of love and tender relations, let me ask a question of my lady readers: Which would you rather know, that the man you love had broken his allegiance to you, but kept his heart faithful, or that he had lost his heart with another woman, but kept his 'monastic' vows? A clever woman once answered me in the following manner: 'If that man was my husband, I would much rather know that his heart had gone from me for a time. If I was not married to him, I would prefer to know that his heart had remained faithful.'

Only I must warn you that if a man put this question to his wife, she would probably say to him at once: 'Jack, which of the two are you guilty of?'

'In ninety cases out of a hundred,' says Paul Bourget, 'for a woman to play her heart in the game of love is to play at cards with a sharper, and gold against counterfeit pieces.' How true! for when the game is over, society (which ought to be ashamed of itself in its treatment of men and women) says of the man, 'Lucky dog!' but mocks at the woman who has given way, puts her outside the pale when she forgets herself for the moment, and turns away from her when she gives way to despair. Poor woman! She cannot rebel, for if man is the cause of her downfall, it is woman who becomes her bitterest enemy. There is no pity in the breast of a woman for the woman who has fallen, unless she herself has had the same sad experience. The virtuous woman is inexorable, although her virtue is very often like a fortress which never had to capitulate for the reason that it never was attacked.

If I were a woman, oh, how I should hate women!

Madame de Staël said that what consoled her to know that she was a woman was that she would never have to marry a woman.

CHAPTER XII

COURTING IN FRANCE AND ENGLAND

The art of courtship as practised in France and England leaves the amorous Gaul sometimes at a decided disadvantage, and sometimes at a marked advantage, by comparison with the Briton. On the whole, I think honours are easy. Take the declaration of love. In France the foolish animal has to go on his knees at the feet of the adored one, who through her modestly drooping eyelashes can make an inventory of the suitor's least defects – of the bald spot on his crown, his languishing eyes, with their white turned up in the ardour of passion, maybe of the little wart which will obtrude itself for observation, especially at such a moment. The poor Frenchman is obliged to run the risk of making himself very ridiculous.

But now turn to England. There, if you would a-wooing go, you sit down comfortably, very much at your ease, with the beloved object of your dreams at your side, or sitting on a cushion at your feet. Thus situated, you can murmur your soft whispers of love into her ears without any risk of dislocating your spinal column. The ladies will possibly think that the business is more nicely arranged in France, but they will hardly get the other sex to agree with them.

In America I never was able to make any observations on the subject. Those provoking Yankees invariably waited until I had left their houses to proceed to business.

What adds, however, to the charm of the French system of making love is that French girls do not enjoy the same freedom as English ones, and that the declarations of love are made in the sweet moments stolen from the watchfulness of their parents.

What, for instance, would an English girl, or for that matter an American one, think of the young lady in M. Victorien Sardou's comedy of 'Old Bachelors,' who, finding herself alone with her lover – a lover to whom she is engaged to be married – reproaches him with having ventured into her presence when he knew that there was no one with her?

'N'est-ce pas que c'est bon d'être ensemble?' pleads the young man.

'Je n'ai pas dit que ce ne fût pas bon,' replies the young lady in good epigrammatic style; 'j'ai dit que ce n'était pas bien.'

To the Anglo-Saxon people who have not familiarized themselves with French customs and modes of thought, it seems simply inconceivable that a girl who intends to entrust to a particular man the happiness of her life should think there could be danger, indiscretion, impropriety of any, even the slightest kind, in talking to him for a few moments without the presence of witnesses.

I have always pitied the English-speaking people for using the second person singular only when addressing the Almighty.

I am not speaking of poetry, of course, but of everyday conversational prose. This second person singular seems to me indispensable for the due expression of love. Where is the Frenchwoman who does not remember with a thrill of pleasure the never-to-be-forgotten moment when her lover, after many times saying to her 'Je vous aime,' got emboldened enough, by her return of his deep affection, to change that 'Je vous aime' into 'Je t'aime'?

She knows that this change of person sealed her fate, that from the very moment that second person singular was used she became his. 'Je vous aime' will, of course, always appeal to the woman who loves the man who utters these words; but when 'Je t'aime' is whispered into her ears, she will close her eyes in ecstasy and be transported to heaven as if for eternal bliss.

This use of the second person singular in love affairs is not the only superiority that the French have over the Anglo-Saxons in the expression of the tender feelings. In England, and I believe also in America, a woman is kissed on the lips by her father, mother, brothers and lady and girl friends. Of course her lover will do the same, with more ardour, more expression, more 'impressions;' but in France this is very seldom the case. Girls are kissed on the forehead by their father, and on the cheeks by all their other relatives and friends. Even a tiny little girl, on being asked for a kiss, will offer her cheeks, never her mouth. The lips are entirely reserved for Cupid.

A French philosopher has said that when a woman has surrendered her lips she has surrendered everything; but he is right only as far as his countrywomen are concerned. Even after saying 'Je vous aime,' the Frenchman will not dare kiss his sweetheart on the lips. It is only after risking the sacred second person singular, 'Je t'aime,' that he will venture to do so, and thus stamp her his.

Well, after all is said and done, I have no doubt that Britons and Americans find that the second person plural, for want of the second person singular, answers the purpose well enough. And for ever and ever men and women will love without attempting to discover new methods or adopt foreign ones. The old story will ever be told; the old method will ever do.

CHAPTER XIII

THE WOMAN-HATER

Should a woman marry a woman-hater? Yes, some people say, because he will pay no attention to any other woman, and will be a faithful husband in all the force of the expression. A woman-hater is par excellence a one-woman's man, and just the sort of man that a woman should wish to marry.

No, other people say, the woman-hater is a no-woman's man. A woman should marry a lover of her sex, and feel proud to know that it is she whom he prefers to all and loves best of all. Of course, they admit that she will have to be careful and ever-watchful in order to keep alive the interest which her husband takes in her and the affection which he feels for her. But a woman-hater is a prig, and the male prig is the last man that a woman should care to marry.

I think the latter are right. The woman-hater hates all women, and will never be capable of any love for his wife any more than for any other woman. Only the sense of ownership will make him value her. He may like her, be a good friend to her, a hard-working and devoted husband, but he will never be a lover to her; and the husband who, during at least the first fifteen years of his married life, cannot now and then be the lover of his wife fails to give to that woman that bliss which is a perfect compensation for all the troubles and miseries of that which the Popes are fond of calling the Vale of Tears, and Mrs. Gamp 'the Wale of Tears.'

The woman-hater is a man who has never petted his mother, who has never been the 'chum' of his sisters, who as a boy has despised girls, and as a young man has treated them with disrespect and even contempt. This kind of man has never once in his life given a thought to woman, has never deemed it consistent with his dignity to devote a minute to the study of her character. He has never given way to her charms, he has never felt her influence, he has never learned to smile kindly at her little foibles and fads. The idea has never occurred to him to indulge her, to treat her, in turn, as a beloved child, even sometimes a spoiled one, as a friend whose advice is worth following nine times out of ten, as a sweet companion either for moments of pleasure or for those of studious retirement. For him woman is a necessary evil. He puts up with her, and is always glad when she is gone. She annoys him, provokes him – nay, even shocks him, and her frivolity is for him a constant source of torment. He breathes more freely when at last he is left alone or finds himself in the company of men at his club.

He is seldom generous, and is not infrequently a miser.

The woman-hater is always conceited, and most generally selfish, and conceit and selfishness are the two worst, the two most objectionable, pieces of furniture in the household of a married couple. The woman-hater is also dull, and often sulky, which is worse still. With him there can be no cheerfulness in the house, and dulness is the bitterest enemy of happiness in matrimony.

The woman-hater has not a redeeming fault or foible which may enable his wife to get hold of him. He has no weaknesses to make him lovable or even tolerable. He is ironclad, and a woman cannot come near him without getting a bruise of some sort or other. He will ever stand before his wife a perfect model for her to look up to, and all her pretty little womanly ways, being a closed letter to him, will be wretchedly wasted on him.

Like all conceited men, the woman-hater has no humour in him. He cannot for the life of him see a joke. A frivolous remark will make him frown. He is a moral man with a vengeance, but all his morality and all the gold in the world are not worth the smile of a genial, cheerful husband. And, worst of all, the woman-hater is generally dyspeptic, and if a woman marries a dyspeptic man she is done for.

The man-flirt is the most despicable creature on earth, but the woman-hater is undoubtedly the most objectionable.

Yes, my dear lady, avoid the woman-hater, and, above all, don't marry him. Have to your wedded husband a lover of women, full of foibles and weaknesses, a man who understands and appreciates women. It will depend upon you whether that man will make the best of husbands or not.

With a woman-lover marriage is a risk; with a woman-hater it is a certainty. With the latter you will be casting pearls before swine.

Marry the former and take your chance.

CHAPTER XIV

WHAT DO WOMEN ADMIRE MOST IN MEN?

I believe that what sexes admire most in the other are the qualities which they do not generally possess themselves. For instance, a man will always tell you that the qualities he admires most in a woman are constancy, good, equal temper, and such others as his most flattering friends would never accuse him of possessing. If, on the other hand, you read the confession-books of women, you will invariably discover that the qualities they most admire in men are generosity, broad-mindedness, magnanimity, absence of prejudice, and a lofty sense of justice, of toleration, and of forgiveness. Now, some women may possess these qualities, but no one, I think, will say that they are eminently feminine virtues.

And it may also be added that what sexes hate most each in the other are the very defects which they themselves not infrequently possess. Out of twenty confession-books which I have this moment under my eyes, and in which is to be found the question, 'What defect do you hate most in man?' eighteen women have answered, 'Meanness.' That is just what you would expect, now, don't you think so?

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