MARRIAGE 



of fiction, is this passion. It has been called an 

 episode only in the life of man, but the very life 

 itself of woman. Less demonstrative, because her 

 role is the more passive one to be sought rather than 

 to seek it holds her under its reign with equal force, 

 and she returns with equal happiness the love she 

 has inspired. 



With the departure from the parental home the 

 new phase of life begins. All through the past the 

 maiden has had few duties to others than herself. 

 Her days have been spent, though she scarcely knows 

 it, much as other young animals spend theirs : in 

 frolicking over the sunny meadows and green path- 

 ways that lie before them, with little care for the 

 moment, and thoughtless confidence in the future. 

 She has now to think for and care for, another than 

 herself. The attention and devotion that the lover 

 gave unremittingly, is replaced by the calmer and 

 milder aifection of the husband, who, returning to his 

 daily duties and habits, now has other thoughts and 

 finds other occupation also. With each of them, the 

 rose-tinted aurora of love's early day, passes into the 

 clearer but less poetic morning of every-day life. 

 With the latter, come the vexations, the trials and the 

 troubles that fall to the lot of all. Happy they who 

 have not been moved to marriage only by mere out- 

 ward charms or by wild gusts of passion, but by love 



349 



