KIDDS OWN JOURNAL. 



241 



TIT-FOR-TAT; 



OR, 



THE GREAT PRINCIPLE. 



- _ ^ NE OF MY PECULIARITIES is — 



f 'ifr&^w a stron S tendency to differ in 

 r wf«t/^> )\ opinion from other people 

 upon almost every possible 

 subject. I never mouth the 

 matter — I come out roundly. 

 I have no doubt the reader 

 is fond of roast-beef and plum-pudding. Now 

 I detest them. Nothing could be more gross, 

 earthly, stultifying. Besides, no man fond of 

 such stuff does, ever did, or ever can sit down 

 to a meal, without running into excess. Then 

 come custard, ice-cream, fruit, almonds, rai- 

 sins, wine. You rise with a distended sto- 

 mach and heavy head; and stagger away 

 ith brutish apathy. i~ am for light diet 

 — milk, rice, fruit ; sweet, harmless things of 

 nature. No lamb bleeds for me. No stately 

 ox is slain that I may feast. Old mother 

 earth supplies my slender appetites. The 

 deep, deep spring, clear as crystal ; the inno- 

 cent vegetables — ethereal food. Thus I am 

 light as air. I am keenly alive to every 

 moral and natural beauty, which few enthu- 

 siastic beef-eaters are. I drink no beer, and 

 I swallow no spirits. I never smoke, and I 

 rise all the year round at five o'clock. 



I differ from everybody in another thing. I 

 believe in love at first sight. We ought to be 

 able to tell in a week, whether a woman would 

 do for a wife. The judgment of " true love" 

 is intuitive. A glance, and it is done. A 

 man of genius has in his own imagination a 

 standard of the object of his love — an unex- 

 plainable model — the prototype to which 

 exists somewhere in reality, although he may 

 never have seen or heard of her. This is 

 wonderful, but it is true. He wanders about 

 the world, impervious to all the delicious, 

 thrilling, soul-melting beams of beauty, till 

 he reaches the right one. There are blue 

 eyes — they are tender, but they touch not 

 him. There are black — they are piercing, 

 but his heart remains whole. At length, 

 accident flings him into contact with a certain 

 creature. He hears the tones of her voice ; 

 he feels the warm streams of soul shining 

 from her countenance. Gaze meets gaze, 

 and thought sparkles into thought, till the 

 magic blaze is kindled, and — they fall in 

 love. 



It sometimes happens that, for one model in 

 the imagination of this man of genius, there 

 are accidentally two or three prototypes in 

 real life ; or rather, he has two or three dif- 

 ferent models. 



It is a great misfortune for a man to have 

 more models than one. They lead him astray. 

 They involve him in difficulties. They play 

 the very deuce with him. And yet meta- 



physicians and phrenologists ought to know, 



that IT IS NO AFFAIR OF HIS. If a School- 



boy have the organ of destructiveness, you 

 may " whip " him for killing flies, but you 



must not wonder at him. If a youth 



But this brings me back again to my subject. 



I never could tell how many of these models 

 Fred had ; a great many, no doubt. He was 

 a true lover of Nature, and all her Ladyship's 

 fair children seemed naturally to love him. 

 They could not help it. 



Oh, those sweet women ! It is almost in- 

 credible. He must have dealt in magic. It 

 was a perfect blessing to be near him ; to catch 

 the light and heat of the thousand glances 

 which fell upon him, and of which he caught 

 a few stray ones, though only by accident. 

 Lovely women fell into his mouth like ripe 

 plums. He had clusters of them. They all 

 loved him, and he loved them all. His was 

 a royal heart 



" What are you thinking of, Fred ? " 

 said I. 



" Caroline," he answered — " of course." 



u She who sailed yesterday for America?" 



" Yes — I LOVE HER." 



"And she?" 



He rose and opened an escritoire. 



" Is it not perfectly beautiful ? " 



The sweet relic of golden, sunshiny hair, 

 lay curled charmingly, in a rose-colored en- 

 velope. It did look pretty. But — 



" Has Caroline B such light hair ? " 



asked I. "J never knew — I always thought 

 — I was observing only yesterday that — 

 surely, surely you have made some mistake — 

 see, what is that written at the bottom of the 



paper 



? < Julia ! ' " 



Fred hastily looked again in the little 

 pigeon-hole, and drew forth another rose- 

 colored envelope ; another I and anotner ! ! 



I smiled ! So did he. 



" What a vile, narrow prejudice it is ! " 

 said Fred. 



"What?" 



" That a man can love only one ! I have 

 loved twenty — fifty — nay, a hundred. I 

 always love some one. Sometimes two at a 

 time — sometimes twenty. I should die 

 else." 



" Heartless !" exclaimed 1. " This is not 

 love. Love is sole, absorbing— pure— con- 

 stant — immutable." 



" Hark'e," said Fred. " I never cease to 

 love. Adding another angel to the list, does 

 not infer the striking out any of the others. 

 Oh — no ! There is no limit. A man of soul 

 loves just as he happens to be placed in rela^ 

 tion to women. I am warmed by them, as I 

 am when 1 stand in the sunshine. Because 

 I have a garden here, when the beams of the 

 god of day fall on my shoulders with a pleas- 

 ing ardor — must I not feel the warmth when 

 I stand in your garden yonder ? It is ' the 



Vol. III. — 16. 



