[Sidenote: Disillusion]
To the girl fed upon fiction, the first proposal comes in the nature of a shock. Disillusion follows as a matter of course. Men, evidently, do not read fiction, or at least do not profit by the valuable hints to be found in any novel.
A small book ent.i.tled: _How Men Propose_, was eagerly sought by young women who were awaiting definite experience. This was discovered to be a collection of proposals carefully selected from fiction. It was done with care and discernment, but was not satisfying. The natural inference was that the actual affairs were just like those in the book.
[Sidenote: "In Books?"]
Nothing can exceed the grace and tenderness with which men propose--in books. Such chivalrous worship, such pleasing deference is accorded--in books! Such pretty pleading, such knightly vows of eternal allegiance, as are always found--in books!
The hero of a few years back was wont to make his offer on his knees. He also haunted the home of the beloved maiden, deeming himself well repaid for five hours wait if he had a fleeting glimpse of her at the window.
Torn hair was frequent, and refusal drove men to suicide and madness.
The young women who were the cause of all this trouble were never more than eighteen or twenty years of age. Mature spinsters of twenty-five figured as envious deterrents in the happy affair. Many a story-book marriage has been spoiled by the jealousy of the wrinkled rival of twenty-five.
[Sidenote: The First Proposal]
The violent protestations of the lover in the novel were indeed something to be awaited with fear and trembling. With her antic.i.p.ations aroused by this kind of reading and her eagerness whetted by interminable years of waiting, Mademoiselle receives her first offer of marriage.
She is in doubt, at first, as to whether it is a proposal. It seems like some dreadful mistake. Where is the courtly manner of the lover in the book? What is the matter with this red-faced boy? Where is the pretty pleading, the gracious speech? Why should a lover stammer and confuse his verbs?
Mademoiselle recoils in disgust. This, then, is what she has been waiting for. It is not at all like the book. Her lover is entirely different from other girls" lovers--so different that he is pathetic.
Her faith in the gospel of romance is sadly shaken, when the next experience is a great deal like the first. No one, in the book, could doubt the lover"s meaning. Yet in the halting sentences and confused metaphors of actual experience, there is sometimes much question as to what he really means. A girl often has to ask a man if he has just proposed to her, that she may accept or refuse, in a gracious and proper way.
[Sidenote: The Ordeal]
In a girl"s early ideas on the subject, she has much sympathy for the man who has to undergo the ordeal of asking a woman to be his wife. She thinks he must contemplate the momentous step for weeks, await the opportunity with expectant terror, and when his lady is in a happy mood, recite with fear and trembling, the proposal which he has written out and learned, appropriately enough, by heart.
Later, she comes to know that after the first few times, men propose as thoughtlessly and easily as they dress for dinner, that they devote no particular study to the art, that constant practice makes them proficient, and that almost any girl will do when the proposal mood is on.
She discovers that they often do it simply to make a pleasing impression upon a girl, with no thought of acceptance. Many an engagement is more of a surprise to the man than to anybody else.
Because fiction comes very near to the heart of woman, she invariably follows its dictates and shows great astonishment at every proposal. The women who have been thus surprised are even more rare than days in June.
[Sidenote: The False and the True]
When a man begins to compare a girl to a flower, a baby, or a kitten, she knows what is coming next. She spends her mental energy in distinguishing the false from the true--which is sufficient employment for anyone. There is not enough cerebral tissue to waste much of it upon unnecessary processes.
It is very hard to tell whether a man really means a proposal. It may have been made under romantic circ.u.mstances, or because he was lonesome for the other girl, or, in the case of an heiress, because he was tired of work. Longing for the absent sweetheart will frequently cause a man to become engaged to someone near by, because, though absence may make a woman"s heart grow fonder, it is presence that plays the mischief with a man. No wise girl would accept a man who proposed by moonlight or just after a meal. The dear things aren"t themselves then.
Food, properly served, will attract a proposal at almost any time, especially if it is known that the pleasing viands were of the girl"s own making. Cooking and love may seem at first glance to be widely separated, but no woman can have one without the other. The brotherly love for all creation, which emanates from the well-fed man, overflows, concentrates, and naturally becomes a proposal.
[Sidenote: Written Proposals]
Other things being equal, a written proposal is apt to be genuine, especially if it is signed with the full name and address of the writer, and the date is not omitted. Long and painful experience in the courts of his country has made man wary of direct evidence.
But a written proposal is extremely bad form. A girl never can be sure that her lover did not attempt to fish it out of the letter-box after it had slipped from his fingers. The author of _How to Be Happy, Though Married_, once saw a miserable young man attempting to get his convicting letter back by means of a forked stick. The sight must be quite common everywhere. Proposing in haste and repenting at leisure is not by any means unusual.
Then, too, a girl misses a possible opportunity of seeing a man blush and stammer. One does not often get a chance to see a man willingly making himself ridiculous, and the spectacle is worth waiting for.
[Sidenote: Confusion and Awkwardness]
Confusion and awkwardness are high trumps with a woman, for they indicate inexperience and uncertainty. The man who proposes in a finished and nonchalant manner, as if he had done it frequently and were sure of the result, is now and then astonished at a refusal. It is also a risk to offer a ring immediately after acceptance. The suspicion is that the ring has been worn before, or else the man was sure enough of the girl to invest heavily in his future.
Sometimes a man will disclose to a platonic friend the form he habitually employs in proposals. The hero of battle engagements has proverbial charm for woman, and the hero of matrimonial engagements is meat and drink to the spinster athirst for knowledge.
Feed the man, and when the brotherly love for the entire universe begins to radiate, approach him gently upon the subject.
"Why, bless your little heart," the man will say, "of course I"ll tell you about it. Yes, you"re right in supposing that I know more about it than anyone else you know. I"ve never been refused in my life and I know I"ve asked a hundred. I"ve had medals for that.
"I always try to make each one different," he will continue. "Girls sometimes compare notes and it makes it awkward. The girl I"m engaged to now doesn"t know any of my other girls, though, so I"m safe enough.
[Sidenote: "One of the Best Proposals"]
"I"ll never forget the way I did that. I think it was one of the best proposals I ever made. She"s a mighty pretty little thing,--blue eyes and black hair,--a regular Irish type. I must tell you first, though, how I came to know her.
"The one I was engaged to just before I asked her, had just broken it off on account of property which her children would lose if she married again. She was a widow, you know. I"ve told you about her--the one with red hair. Between you and me, that"s the only woman in G.o.d"s world my heart ever went out to. That is the love of my life. Her little girl, eleven years old, was in love with me, too. She used to tremble when I kissed her, and was jealous of her mother. But this little girl I"m engaged to now, why I just love the ground she walks on.
[Sidenote: "A Very Peculiar Affair"]
"Well," after a pause, "this was a very peculiar affair. Of course I was all broken up over losing her--couldn"t eat nor sleep--I was a perfect wreck. This old friend of mine happened along, and he says, "You"ll have to brace up, old man. Come on out to my house in the country and rest up a bit." So I went, and met his daughter.
"Five days after I met her, I asked him for her hand. I explained it to him just as I would to my own father, and he understood all right. He"s a fine fellow. He said I could have her. Of course I"d asked her first.
"Yes--I"m getting to that. I took her out for a walk one afternoon, and when we came to the river, we sat down to talk. It was a perfect day. I began by saying how sad it was to see a beautiful flower and to know that it was out of one"s reach, or to see anything beautiful and know that one never could possess it. I led up to the subject by gentle degrees, and then I said: "You must have seen that I love you, and you know without my telling you, that I want you to be my wife. I don"t say I want you to marry me, because I want you to do more than that--I want you to be my wife." (Fine distinction that!)
"Well, she was very much surprised, of course, but she accepted me all right. Yes, I told her about the other woman, but in such a way that she understood it perfectly. Lots of other fellows wanted her and I s.n.a.t.c.hed the prize from right under their very noses. I don"t suppose I"ll ever propose any more now. I"d never propose to you, even if I were free to do so, because I know you"d refuse me. You"d refuse me, wouldn"t you?
Somebody else might just as well have me, if you don"t want me."
[Sidenote: In Spite of Varied Resources]
Yet in spite of the varied resources at woman"s command, we sometimes hear of one who yearns for the privilege of seeking man in marriage. The woman who longs for the right to propose is evidently not bright enough to bring a man to the point.
Still worse than this, there are cases on record where women, not reigning queens, have actually proposed to men. The men who are thus sought in the bonds of matrimony are not slow to tell of it, confining themselves usually to their own particular circle of men friends. But the news sometimes filters through man"s capacity to keep a secret, and the knowledge is diffused among interested spinsters.
[Sidenote: Hints]
What men term "hints" are not out of place, for the proposal market would be less active, were it not for "hints." But these are seldom given in words--unless a man happens to be particularly stupid.
When the proposal habit is not firmly fastened upon a man, and he begins to have serious designs upon some one girl, she knows it long before he does. Incidentally, the family and the neighbours have their suspicions.
Woman, with her strong dramatic instinct, wishes the proposal to occur according to accepted rules. Hence, if a man shows symptoms of whispering the momentous question in a crowd, he is apt to be delicately discouraged, and if the girl is not satisfied with her own appearance, there will also be postponement. No girl wants to be proposed to when her hair is dishevelled, her collar wilted, and her soul distraught by pestiferous mosquitoes.
But an ambitious and painstaking girl will arrange the stage for a proposal, with untiring patience, months before it actually happens.
When she practices a.s.siduously all the morning, that she may execute difficult pa.s.sages with apparent ease in the evening, and willingly turns the freezer that there may be cooling ice opportunely left after dinner, to "melt if somebody doesn"t eat it," she expects something to happen.
When the man finally appears, and the little brother marches off like a well-trained soldier, with two nickels jingling in his pocket, even the victim might be on his guard. When the family are unceremoniously put out of the house, and father, mother, and sisters are seen in the summer twilight, wandering in disconsolate pairs, let the neighbours keep away from the house under penalty of the girl"s lasting hate.
Sometimes, when the family have been put out, and the common human interest leads intimate spinster friends to pa.s.s the house, there is nothing to be seen but the girl playing accompaniments for the man while he sings.