Should I have fallen in love with her had I
met her for the first time as she is now? Yes, and no! In the old days
there was something about her that commanded me--that fascinated my
youthful imagination. Perhaps it was only the freshness, the ignorance,
the timidity of young maidenhood--that mystery of possibilities of a
nature that has not yet met the world and received its impress for good
or evil. It is this which captivates in youth; and this, of course,
Mrs. Courtney has lost. But every quality that might captivate mature
manhood is hers, and, were I likely to think of marriage now, and were
she marriageable, she is the type of woman I would choose. Yet I do not
quite relish the perception that my present feminine ideal (whether it
be lower or higher) is not the former one. But,--frankly, would I marry
her if I could? I hardly know: I have got out of the habit of regarding
marriage as among my possibilities; many avenues of happiness that once
were open to me are now closed against me. Put it, that I have lost a
faculty--that I am now able to enjoy only in imagination a phase of
existence that, formerly, I could have enjoyed in fact.
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