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CHAPTER X.

LOVE, COURTSHIP, AND MARRIAGE: GENTLEMEN'S QUERIES.

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"O, it will never do!' he said,

'The social power must be obeyed;
Such joy to hear a female tone,
I'll marry-I'll not live alone :
I'd sooner wed the first I see,
Though old and ugly she should be,
Than live in taciturnity.

Nay, ere another week is o'er,
I will begin the important tour,

Nor e'er return, if I have life,

Till I have found another wife!''

- Dr. Syntax In Search of a Wife, Canto I.

"Q. An humble servant of your godship is desirous to know whether the running away with a very pretty lady and an heiress to a very large fortune (though with her own consent) deserves hanging. And which is the securest way to accomplish so ticklish an undertaking?

"A. If your chambers in the Temple be not for a more secure retirement after your diversion of

fortune-hunting, but that you are one of a true solid kind, wonderful clear, we mean, of all ideas, inventive, national or contemplative, and thereby adapted to the pursuit of the law: If you can fare 12 hours without refreshment on Coke upon Littleton and then rise up not a jot wiser than when you sat down: If you can thrash at your studies daily, till you get a handful of wheat out of a horse-load of chaff: If you are this accomplished mortal, then give over such pieces of knighterrantry till you are turned of 40, or you will not get bread to your onions. But if you are the other person, a very and mere fortune-hunter, then by no means find fault with the severity of the law, which gives you so fair an opportunity of expressing a proof of your passion. Butler tells you :

'For he that hangs, or beats out brains,
The devil's in it, if he feigns.'

When the lady sees you go seriously on in a certain way to be hanged for her sake, she will be ready to hang herself to get at you. Now we will advise you how to manage this ticklish point: Contrive it so that she may steal you away, but in some manner as may not give the least umbrage of your being accessory to it, which would spoil all.

Therefore, get a lodging on the monument; let her in the dead of the night scale by a rope to the top, assault your fortress and carry you off on her back in triumph; should you meet the watch, the sound of your terrible name would fright 'em. Thus the theft, never fear, will be charged on her, and you come off with flying colours."

"Q. I have kept company with a young woman this half-year, designing to make her my wife, and she hath given her consent; but I fear she doth not really love me, because when I am in company with her, and a near relation of hers, who knows the suit from the beginning, she seems strange; and if I kiss her, immediately she wipes her lips, but is not willing I should see her; if I ask her concerning matrimony, she is always free?

"A. Alas, poor gentleman! let not the abundance of your love be the occasion of such surmises. Modesty is the peculiar attribute of the female sex, and if any be divested of it, she may then properly be said to degenerate from the sane: and this we take to be the grounds of your intimations, and the invalid cause of your rash complaint. Blame not then your fair one, if she give you some tokens of her natural endowments, or if she receive your

favours with willing indifference, like that of the

poet:

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Dum fragrantia detorquet ad oscula
Cervicem, aut facili servitia negat,
Quae posceate magis gaudeat cripi,
Interdum rapere occupet.

When she's to balmy kisses prone,
Or with a fictitious frown denies,

Or sometimes joys to snatch the prize

Which she thro' force would have her own."

"Q. Gentlemen, I have long passionately lov'd a lady, who for her excellent perfections rather merits adoration. I have passed through all the probationary injunctions of a lover, given myself violent airs, then sigh'd, whin'd, pip'd under her windows, looked like an ass, went slovenly, forgot to blow my nose and made verses; nay, I had certainly attempted to kill myself, but that I feared her consent to it. Now, pray resolve me, if this divine creature, this illustrious goddess, in regard to all I have suffered for her sake, is not oblig'd in gratitude to return love for love?

"A. Certainly no. It argues worse than pagan stupidity, to expect the object of our worship

should make reciprocal returns; it is sufficient, if she accepts your offerings, but presumption to expect so much, as familiar conference with a superior power; were she convinced that you were such another divine creature (of which your going slovenly, and looking like an ass gives us little hopes) she might possibly admit of parley, but even then would not be under the least obligation of making mutual return, for that would encroach. on the freedom of her choice, and reduce her to a more servile condition than your own. Therefore, if your goddess be inexorable, the best advice we can give is, to comfort yourself with an Epicuras's maxim, that your sufferings cannot be great and long; perhaps she may honour your ashes with so much compunction, as to sigh, and say, 'tis pity— and so call for the cards."

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"Q. I have been long in love with a pretty young lady, but she's very coy to me. Pray instruct me how to obtain her?

"A. Talk as wittily to her as you write to Apollo, and she must have a heart of adamant to stand the shock of your addresses."

"Q. Gentlemen, I have long admired a young lady that sits over against me at church, to whom I have sent several letters, none of which are an

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