said Miss Ley, who did not like the neighboring squire’s mother, “I don’t know what Mr. Branderton has to recommend him beyond the possession of four or five generations of particularly stupid ancestors and two or three thousand acres which he can neither let nor sell.”
“Of course Mr. Craddock is a very worthy young man,” added Miss Glover, who was afraid she had said too much. “If you approve of the match no one else can complain.”
“I don’t approve of the match, Miss Glover, but I’m not such a fool as to oppose it. Marriage is always a hopeless idiocy for a woman who has enough money of her own to live upon.”
“It’s an institution of the Church, Miss Ley,” replied Miss Glover, rather severely.
“Is it?” retorted Miss Ley. “I always thought it was an arrangement to provide work for the judges in the Divorce Court.”
To this Miss Glover very properly made no answer.
“Do you think they’ll be happy together?”
“I think it very improbable,” said Miss Ley.
“Well, don’t you think it’s your duty—excuse my mentioning it, Miss Ley—to do something?”
“My dear Miss Glover, I don’t think they’ll be more unhappy than most married couples; and one’s greatest duty in this world is to leave people alone.”
“There I cannot agree with you,” said Miss Glover, bridling. “If duty was not more difficult than that there would be no credit in doing it.”
“Ah, my dear, your idea of a happy life is always to do the disagreeable thing: mine is to gather the roses—with gloves on, so that the thorns should not prick me.”
“That’s not the way to win the battle, Miss Ley. We must all fight.”
“My dear Miss Glover!” said Bertha’s aunt.
She fancied it a little impertinent for a woman twenty years younger than herself to exhort her to lead a better life. But the picture of that poor, ill-dressed creature fighting with a devil, cloven-footed, betailed and behorned, was as pitiful as it was comic; and with difficulty Miss Ley repressed an impulse to argue and to startle a little her estimable friend.
But at that moment Dr. Ramsay came in. He shook hands with both ladies.
“I thought I’d look in to see how Bertha was,” he said.
“Poor Mr. Craddock has another adversary,” remarked Miss Ley. “Miss Glover thinks I ought to take the affair seriously.”
“I do, indeed,” said Miss Glover.
“Ever since I was a young girl,” said Miss Ley, “I’ve been trying not to take things seriously, and I’m afraid now I’m hopelessly frivolous.”
The contrast between this assertion and Miss Ley’s prim manner was really funny, but Miss Glover saw only something quite incomprehensible.
“After all,” added Miss Ley, “nine marriages out of ten are more or less unsatisfactory. You say young Branderton would have been more suitable; but really a string of ancestors is no particular assistance to matrimonial felicity, and otherwise I see no marked difference between him and Edward Craddock. Mr. Branderton has been to Eton and Oxford, but he conceals the fact with very great success. Practically he’s just as much a gentleman-farmer as Mr. Craddock; but one family is working itself up and the other is working itself down. The Brandertons represent the past and the Craddocks the future; and though I detest reform and progress, so far as matrimony is concerned I prefer myself the man who founds a family to the man who ends it. But, good Heavens! you’re making me sententious.”
It was curious how opposition was making Miss Ley almost a champion of Edward Craddock.
“Well,” said the doctor, in his heavy way, “I’m in favour of every one sticking to his own class. Nowadays, whoever a man is he wants to be the next thing better; the labourer apes the tradesman, the tradesman apes the professional man.”
“And the professional man is worst of all, dear doctor,” said Miss Ley, “for he apes the noble lord, who seldom affords a very admirable example. And the amusing thing is that each set thinks itself quite as good as those above, while harbouring profound contempt for all below. In fact the only members of society who hold themselves in proper estimation are the servants. I always think that the domestics of gentlemen’s houses in South Kensington are several degrees less odious than their masters.”
This was not a subject which Miss Glover or Dr. Ramsay could discuss, and there was a momentary pause.
“What single point can you bring in favour of this marriage?” asked the doctor, suddenly.
Miss Ley looked at him as if she were thinking, then, with a dry smile: “My dear doctor, Mr. Craddock is so matter of fact—the moon will never rouse him to poetic ecstasies.”
“Miss Ley!” said the parson’s sister, in a tone of entreaty.
Miss Ley glanced from one to the other. “Do you want my serious opinion?” she asked, rather more gravely than usual. “The girl loves him, my dear doctor. Marriage, after all, is such a risk that only passion makes it worth while.”
Miss Glover looked up uneasily at the word passion.
“Yes, I know what you all think in England,” said Miss Ley, catching the glance and its meaning. “You expect people to marry from every reason except the proper, one—and that is the instinct of reproduction.”
“Miss Ley!” exclaimed Miss Glover, blushing.
“Oh, you’re old enough to take a sensible view of the, matter,” answered Miss Ley, somewhat brutally. “Bertha is merely the female attracted to the male, and that is the only decent foundation of marriage—the other way seems to me merely horrid. And what does it matter if the man is not of the same station, the instinct has nothing to do with the walk in life; if I’d ever been in love I shouldn’t have cared if it was a pot-boy, I’d have married him—if he asked me.”
“Well, upon my word!” said the doctor.
But Miss Ley was roused now, and interrupted him: “The particular function of a woman is to propagate her species; and if she’s wise she’ll choose a strong and healthy man to be the father of her children. I have no patience with those women who marry a man because he’s got brains. What is the good of a husband who can make abstruse mathematical calculations? A woman wants a man with strong arms and the digestion of an ox.”
“Miss Ley,” broke in Miss Glover, “I’m not clever enough to argue with you, but I know you’re wrong. I don’t think I am right to listen to you; I’m sure Charles wouldn’t like it.”
“My dear, you’ve been brought up like the majority of English girls—that is, like a fool.”
Poor Miss Glover blushed. “At all events I’ve been brought up to regard marriage as a holy institution. We’re here upon earth to mortify the flesh, not to indulge it. I hope I shall never be tempted to think of such matters in the way you’ve suggested. If ever I marry I know that nothing will be further from me than carnal thoughts. I look upon marriage as a spiritual union
