Chapter XXXVI: A Whisper to Romantic Young Ladies

"A crust of bread, a pitcher of water, a thatched roof, and
love,--there's happiness for you."

Girls! _that's a humbug!_ The very _thought_ of it makes me groan. It's all moonshine. In fact, men and moonshine in my dictionary are synonymous.

"Water and a crust! RATHER spare diet! May do for the honey-moon. Don't make much difference _then_, whether you eat shavings or sardines--but when you return to _substantials_, and your wedding dress is put away in a trunk for the benefit of posterity, if you can get your husband to _smile_ on anything short of a 'sirloin' or a roast turkey, you are a lucky woman.

"Don't every married woman know that a man is as savage as a New Zealander when he's hungry? and when he comes home to an empty cupboard and meets a dozen little piping mouths, (necessary accompaniments of 'cottages' and 'love,' clamorous for supper, '_Love_ will have the _sulks_,' or my name isn't Fanny. Lovers have a trick of getting disenchanted, too, when they see their Aramintas with dresses pinned up round the waist, hair powdered with sweeping, faces scowled up over the wash-tub, and soap-suds dripping from red elbows.

"We know these little accidents never happen in novels--where the heroine is always 'dressed in white, with a rose-bud in her hair,' and lives on blossoms and May dew! There are no wash-tubs or gridirons in _her_ cottage; _her_ children are born cherubim, with a seraphic contempt for dirt pies and molasses. _She_ remains 'a beauty' to the end of the chapter, and 'steps out' just in time to anticipate her first gray hair, her husband drawing his last breath at the same time, as a dutiful husband _should_; and not falling into the unromantic error of outliving his grief, and marrying a second time!

"But this humdrum life, girls, is another affair, with its washing and ironing and cleaning days, when children expect boxed ears, and visitors picked-up dinners. All the 'romance' there is in it, you can put under a three-cent piece!

"St. Paul says they who marry do well enough, but they who _don't_ marry do WELL-ER! Sensible man that. Nevertheless, had _I_ flourished in those times, I would have undertaken to change his sentiments; for those old-fashioned gentlemen were worth running after.

"One half the women marry for fear they shall be old maids. Now I'd like to know why an old maid is to be snubbed, any more than an old bachelor? Old bachelors receive 'the mitten,' occasionally, and old maids have been known to _outlive several 'offers.'_ They are both useful in their way--particularly old bachelors!

"Now _I_ intend to be an old maid; and I shall found a mutual accommodation society, and admit old bachelors honorary members. They shall wait on _us_ evenings, and we'll hem their pocket hand-ker_chers_ and mend their gloves. No _boys under thirty_ to be admitted. Irreproachable dickeys, immaculate shirt-bosoms and faultless boots _indispensable_. Gentlemen always to sit on the _opposite_ side of the room--no refreshments but _ices_! _Instant expulsion_ the consequence of the first attempt at love-making! No allusion to be made to Moore or Byron! The little '_bye-laws_' of the society _not_ to be published! Moonlight evenings, the sisters are not at home! the moon being considered, from time immemorial, an unprincipled magnetiser!"