LAZY THOUGHTS OF A LAZY GIRL. ON LOVE 9

Of course I am speaking generally. As far as I can see, the majority
act thus, though I am glad to say that many and various are the
exceptions. It was only the other day I came across our washerwoman
and asked her how she and her husband got on together. He used to be a
drunkard, and used her cruelly, but two years ago he took the pledge,
and, what is more, he kept it. "Lor', mum," she exclaimed fervently,
"we draws nearer every day!" I am afraid not many husbands and wives
could say the same.

LAZY THOUGHTS OF A LAZY GIRL. ON LOVE 8

Some get married at once, some wait a long time, and some do not marry
at all. These last are, I think, generally the happiest, for this
so-called love lasts for only a very short time, and neither husband
nor wife are long before they console themselves with someone else's
affection to make up for what is wanting on the part of the other.

LAZY THOUGHTS OF A LAZY GIRL.ON LOVE 7

Therefore I think we owe Jacob a great many grudges. He was the
inventor of the tender passion, and since his time people have begun
to follow his example long before they come to years of discretion,
simply because their parents did so before them, and they think they
are not grown up, that they are not men, unless they have some love
affair on hand.

LAZY THOUGHTS OF A LAZY GIRL ON LOVE 6

Poor men, they deserve a little of our pity too, perhaps; for if Mrs.
Noah and her daughters-in-law at all resembled their effigies in the
Noah's Arks of the present day, they were women to be avoided, _I_
think.
So that, after all, it must have been Jacob who set such a very
foolish example; because we could not count Isaac, his being so
extraordinary and isolated a case, when he fell in love with his own
wife!

LAZY THOUGHTS OF A LAZY GIRL ON LOVE 5

Neither do we hear much of Noah's domestic experiences, but I should
conclude on the whole that they were not happy. No man could be
endured for forty days shut up in the house, no business to go to,
nothing to do, always hanging about, his idle hands at some mischief
or other, and last, but not least, a diabolical temper, displayed at
every turn! Why, I cannot endure one for a week! My only wonder is
that the female population of the Ark did not rise up in a body and
consign their lords and masters to the floods.