The Sentimentalists | Page 6

good sort of boy. Girls like him. Why does he not
fix his attention upon one of them; Why upon me? We waste our time
in talking of him . . . . The secret of it is, that he has no reverence. The
marriage he vaunts is a mere convenient arrangement for two to live
together under command of nature. Reverence for the state of marriage
is unknown to him. How explain my feeling? I am driven into silence.

Cease to speak of him . . . . He is the dupe of his eloquence--his passion,
he calls it. I have only to trust myself to him, and--I shall be one of the
world's married women! Words are useless. How am I to make him see
that it is I who respect the state of marriage by refusing; not he by
perpetually soliciting. Once married, married for ever. Widow is but a
term. When women hold their own against him, as I have done, they
will be more esteemed. I have resisted and conquered. I am sorry I do
not share in the opinion of your favourite.
LYRA: Mine?
ASTRAEA: You spoke warmly of him.
LYRA: Warmly, was it?
ASTRAEA: You are not blamed, my dear: he has a winning manner.
LYRA: I take him to be a manly young fellow, smart enough;
handsome too.
ASTRAEA: Oh, he has good looks.
LYRA: And a head, by repute.
ASTRAEA: For the world's work, yes.
LYRA: Not romantic.
ASTRAEA: Romantic ideas are for dreamy simperers.
LYRA: Amazons repudiate them.
ASTRAEA: Laugh at me. Half my time I am laughing at myself. I
should regain my pride if I could be resolved on a step. I am strong to
resist; I have not strength to move.
LYRA: I see the sphinx of Egypt!
ASTRAEA: And all the while I am a manufactory of gunpowder in this

quiet old-world Sabbath circle of dear good souls, with their
stereotyped interjections, and orchestra of enthusiasms; their tapering
delicacies: the rejoicing they have in their common agreement on all
created things. To them it is restful. It spurs me to fly from rooms and
chairs and beds and houses. I sleep hardly a couple of hours. Then into
the early morning air, out with the birds; I know no other pleasure.
LYRA: Hospital work for a variation: civil or military. The former
involves the house-surgeon: the latter the grateful lieutenant.
ASTRAEA: Not if a woman can resist . . . I go to it proof-armoured.
LYRA: What does the Dame say?
ASTRAEA: Sighs over me! Just a little maddening to hear.
LYRA: When we feel we have the strength of giants, and are bidden to
sit and smile! You should rap out some of our old sweet-innocent
garden oaths with her--'Carnation! Dame!' That used to make her dance
on her seat.--'But, dearest Dame, it is as natural an impulse for women
to have that relief as for men; and natural will out, begonia! it will!' We
ran through the book of Botany for devilish objurgations. I do believe
our misconduct caused us to be handed to the good man at the altar as
the right corrective. And you were the worst offender.
ASTRAEA: Was I? I could be now, though I am so changed a creature.
LYRA: You enjoy the studies with your Spiral, come!
ASTRAEA: Professor Spiral is the one honest gentleman here. He does
homage to my principles. I have never been troubled by him: no silly
hints or side-looks--you know, the dog at the forbidden bone.
LYRA: A grand orator.
ASTRAEA: He is. You fix on the smallest of his gifts. He is
intellectually and morally superior.
LYRA: Praise of that kind makes me rather incline to prefer his

inferiors. He fed gobble-gobble on your puffs of incense. I coughed and
scraped the gravel; quite in vain; he tapped for more and more.
ASTRAEA: Professor Spiral is a thinker; he is a sage. He gives women
their due.
LYRA: And he is a bachelor too--or consequently.
ASTRAEA: If you like you may be as playful with me as the Lyra of
our maiden days used to be. My dear, my dear, how glad I am to have
you here! You remind me that I once had a heart. It will beat again with
you beside me, and I shall look to you for protection. A novel request
from me. From annoyance, I mean. It has entirely altered my character.
Sometimes I am afraid to think of what I was, lest I should suddenly
romp, and perform pirouettes and cry 'Carnation!' There is the bell. We
must not be late when the professor condescends to sit for meals.
LYRA: That rings healthily in the professor.
ASTRAEA: Arm in arm, my Lyra.
LYRA: No Pluriel yet!
(They enter